Final(?) version of the master map as of June 8th 2023

Barring any truly unforeseen circumstances I am done fiddling around with the master map. True, never say never minor tweaks might yet happen as I go into the detailed maps but I feel I can safely say that there will not be anymore major revision!

So here it is in all it's glory! This started as a sketch back in the summer between grade 11 and grade 12 while I was spending a month in France 'learning' French. (I did not succeed) It certainly has changed a lot over the years.

Thanks to Inkarnate I have been able to render the map the way I have always wanted. Gone are the colour water colour pencils and the reams of paper. No more erasure marks creased or damaged paper, finally a digital copy that I can share and easily replicate. It also means I now have a detailed map of the world not just a collection of individual maps.

Now my original maps contained elements that were inspired by the fantasy books of the day, so there were tributes to Conan, LoTR, Sword of Shannara, Riddlemaster of Hed, Earthsea, Kurtz's Deryni series and many more. There was also a smattering of ideas from RPG supplements, most notably Judges Guild products.

Skip ahead to today and you can see that I have transplanted complete areas from other game worlds, fantasy novels and gaming supplements. The south central area is made up of most of the 18 maps from JG Wilderlands set. The eastern lands have a lot of Conan names (as do the north eastern areas) while to their north one can find Harn more or less intact. (Orbaal has some more separation from the rest of Harn) Now not everything is as created by the original authors. For one thing by my shifting of nations around pell mell a lot of the written 'history' of these places no longer work. Instead I am using the names as a short cut to conjure up images, rough guidelines of what can be expected without us having to be confined/restricted to what others have written. By the same token I do consult the books about these places to draw inspiration. 

Where ever I have incorporated the maps of certain fantasy regions/cities such as Judges Guild & Harn regional maps & the cities of Lankmar, Sanctuary & Haven I have tried to maintain the maps as they are and kept the known information mostly intact. 

It perhaps needs to be stated that my world does actually contain places that I created from my own feeble mind. Some obviously inspired by the books that I have read but many are either significantly different or wholly my own. Earthscar drew some inspiration from Mordor, but where Mordor had a mountain I decided to go down into the earth. Beyond that original decision, the actual nature of Earthscar and it's role in my world is very different that Mordor. 

The middle section, from Mercia to the plains of Renin were influenced by Kurtz but not a copy of her works. The Sersingian Empire existed long before I ever encountered GW's Empire. So while I have made use of the names of Tilea and Estalia, the empire is more Byzantium or Rome than Germanic warhammer. 

Rightly or wrongly we (myself and a player) decided to add the Holy lands to the world. So to the east of the JG maps one can find Earths holy lands more or less to scale but with significant cultural differences. Certain event did not happen in this world, certain messiahs and prophets did not quite achieve the fame and success that they did in our world. The existence fantasy elements, other active deities, monsters and the Eastern Empire have had an impact on how this world has advanced.

 Next I shall be making smaller more detailed maps from this master map. First up I have sliced the map into 4 sections; the cold wastes, the north, the middle lands and the south lands. I may yet divide these 4 maps into smaller regional sections maybe 2 per section. I have already created a separate Middle Empire map just because the empire crosses over two sectional maps.  

More on this later...