I thought I should probably do a quick post today showing some of my creative endeavors lately. My wife and I have been busy preparing for the imminent arrival of our second child, so I haven't had much for free time, and what I have had has been mostly used for getting in some gaming. Today, I decided to do a couple more updates to my #ttrpg setting, Trothguard.
Today's work mostly consisted of adding my numbered city bubbles, adding in some colour around some trees and inland seas, and penciling in the very first draft of the Kingdom names. I think I also added a couple of forests and some more mountains.
Comparing my "version 2" map with the "version 3" map to ensure I'm not missing anything unintended:
In the update, I've definitely gotten rid of some things from the old map. Some regions of forest haven't been pulled into the new version, and I've improved the look of the islands on the far right of the map. The mystery kingdom of Mach'Lithe is now properly mapped, so that I can depict it's regions differently this go-around.
I still have a few To Do items on this version before it's done. I need to add the Great Ruins to my new map, as well as figure out some way to depict deserts and magical dead-zones. Mach'Lithe's border is another area I have to decide how I want to represent, so I think what I'm going to do is print some copies of the map to mess around with so that I don't feel like I'm taking chances with the core map I'm working on.
A scan of today's finished work:
There's some things in this copy of the map that I'm definitely not satisfied with - like my choice to add the rivers to the map in Arabeth. Mapping the rivers I think adds very little value, and in my opinion, doesn't look good. I may end up adding rivers across the entire map and then just editing them out so I have a 'with rivers' and 'without rivers' version of the exact same map to put on my table when my next party is adventuring in this setting. We'll see. I have some time (thanks Corona) before I need to worry about that.
Note: this post was originally published in OnChainArt, but apparently doesn't fit the style or quality of art that they want and was subsequently removed - so I've reposted it here. If you've seen this twice, that's why. Sorry for the confusion.
For a repository of the various maps and updates to this project that I've made, check out my Instagram, where I post all my cartography work:
