Worldbuilding

Questions tagged [map-making]

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For questions that have to do with the science or practice of drawing maps. If the question has to do with making maps this tag is a good fit. Note: This tag is about creating maps of physical features, not creating the physical features themselves nor using the maps for navigation. For that see the geography tag or navigation tag..

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3
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3answers
169 views

How to map a world that changes continuously?

This world is made of living creatures instead of land. Many, small or big, some as big as Scotland, moving around the world. What they eat doesn't matter, how they are alive doesn't matter. The ...
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1answer
62 views

Does anyone know of a stellar map that gives the distance between the nearest systems? [closed]

What im looking is for something like this but with more stars
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2answers
325 views

How do mermaids map ocean currents?

Humans lay road to gain fast access to distant places until aeroplane is invented, I would presume the mermaids living underwater can make use of the strong water current to get around the ocean ...
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8answers
2k views

When starting a new village, what are the sequence of buildings built?

Obviously I know that everyone who is living there is going to want a house but what comes after? Do they build a butcher’s building next or maybe a blacksmith’s building? And what comes after that? ...
6
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9answers
947 views

Different ways of going about worldbuilding besides making up words and drawing maps?

I'm really not interested in creating a language for my world, especially having to make up names for the peoples and places. Or drawing maps. Mainly because I'm neither a good linguist nor a good ...
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3answers
141 views

How do I draw these weird mountains on a map?

My world is covered in these- How do I draw them on a map? You can't draw them like a normal mountain, they're too different. Plus, these are my land- nobody lives anywhere except for on these ...
0
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1answer
97 views

How do I start building a map worthy of a society? [closed]

How do I take a fantasy society with their own variations (architecture, fields, etc,) and the basic landforms I want to see, and integrate it into a map with determinable borders, cities, for better ...
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3answers
216 views

Map projection for a pseudospherical world

A pseudosphere (or antisphere or tractricoid) has a surface of constant negative Gaussian curvature, in contrast to a sphere, which has constant positive Gaussian curvature. Source: http://xahlee....
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4answers
305 views

Where would rivers and lakes make sense on this continent?

Fellow world-builders, I need some guidance. I've been drawing a map of the continent Anai'vora, the landmass where my current D&D Campaign takes place. I'm very new to world building, and this is ...
2
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2answers
123 views

How many Ultra massive black holes should be added to a map of known black holes?

I was wondering how many Ultra-massive black holes can be added to the list of 8 known black holes with mass over 10 billion solar masses within 1 billion light years. Looking at our current maps, the ...
3
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1answer
171 views

When designing a map of the local universe how should currently unknown/obscured areas be treated?

I am building a map of the local universe for my story and for the time being I will base it on the real universe and our current understandings and observations although later will likely change the ...
9
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5answers
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Is there any other ways to represent a star chart that is not the classic bright dots on a black field?

So, I am modding a game where the distance in pixels between star systems DOES matter on how the game calculate stuff. We currently have a cool looking sub-way style map, with a lot of things in ...
2
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2answers
184 views

Are my plate tectonics/land masses realistic?

I'm building a new planet up from scratch, and wanted to get a sanity check on my plate tectonics and land masses. It doesn't have to be 100% realistic, but I'd like it to be plausible to someone who ...
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1answer
118 views

Is Alagaesia a climatically realistic world?

https://inheritance.fandom.com/wiki/Alagaësia https://www.paolini.net/2017/11/10/map-alagaesia-prints-2017/ Looking at the map, you have a tropical desert at around the same latitudes as Urubaen. ...
4
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1answer
184 views

I would appreciate your advice on the climate of my world

There are some things I don't understand. So far I have my map pretty developed but I think I made some mistakes and there are places I am not sure about. I know I made some mistakes with ocean ...
5
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2answers
155 views

What needs to be changed about the plate tectonics of my world?

So, after trying to make a few different world maps and not really feeling satisfied with them, I decided to attempt making a world a bit more from scratch, by adding in plate tectonics. Now, I did ...
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11answers
4k views

Can a low-tech sailing ship tell how deep the water is?

I'm trying to figure out the challenges faced by a low-tech civilization mapping its world. They have access to roughly Renaissance level technology, plus some (not very abundant) magic. One question ...
19
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5answers
9k views

How do I put a rectangular map onto a globe?

I've spent time hand-drawing, and then scanning, and colorizing a world map using Paint.Net. The map uses a rectangular projection (something like an Equirectangular, Plate Caree, or Behrmann ...
2
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1answer
141 views

What types of climate would form under set conditions?

The continent is located on the Earth-like planet. The first map depicts a rough Köppen classification (which is there to give you bit of a context). Note that: Types 13 and 14 are undefined/...
8
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3answers
485 views

Kingdom creation calculations [closed]

Ok, here is the deal... In my story, I am trying to create a small kingdom containing somewhere 1000-1500 people with a 30-70% female to male ratio & 10-90% children to adult ratio. It is an old ...
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2answers
66 views

Population spread of frontier settlements [closed]

Here's the situation... In 1000 BCE 5000 people from 13 cultures each are transported to a whole other world, for a total of 65000 people. These culture group together and divide up so that we have a ...
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3answers
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What tool can I use to draw a simple map of a fictional world?

This Query is part of the Worldbuilding Resources Article. I want to draw a map of a fictional world, which consists of two regions (countries), separated by mountains. Are there any tools which ...
7
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3answers
381 views

What tool or Program can be used to add “info pins” to custom fantasy maps

Firstly, Allow me to apologize if this is not relevant on on topic for this stack exchange, but I'm at a loss here and hope someone can help. I have created a rough map for my world using Krita (...
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9answers
3k views

Algorithm or tool to design a worldwide subway transit map?

As the question says, an impossible (not earth) futuristic world has a subway system spanning across the entire planet and I would like to design its transit map. The obvious problem with doing this ...
5
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2answers
190 views

Climate Map Climate

My friend and I are working on this world called Roia. It shares many terrestrial properties with the real life earth: composition, axial tilt, distance from the star, presence of water, etc. You can ...
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2answers
3k views

What would the world map look like if sea levels rose 49 meters

If the sea levels of Earth were to suddenly rise by 49 meters, or 160.7 feet, what would the world map look like?
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0answers
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Advice on Accuracy of World Map (cont) [closed]

As a continuation of this question. Thanks to the comments in the previous question, we managed to overhaul the map. It's cleaner and more believable, I think. However, there were some new questions ...
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4answers
278 views

Advice on accuracy of world map

My friend and I are working on a map of a globe. The setting of this universe involve various intelligent animal species divided into 5 clades: Archo (Crocodilians), Avians (Birds), Aquatics (Fish), ...
2
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1answer
127 views

Can someone rate and critique my map? [closed]

this is my first time making a map or even world building, I tried to follow as much as i could some YouTube tutorial and created this map. Can someone give me tips and how to improve the map. Thanks! ...
13
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1answer
372 views

Where do hydrothermal vents form inside icy ocean worlds?

Context: In a near-future version of our solar system, humans have established multiple underwater colonies on Jupiter's moon Europa. Many of these outposts are situated next to hydrothermal vents ...
5
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1answer
506 views

Software for creating a 3D planet [duplicate]

(Sorry for my English, it's not my native language. I use Google translate.) I am looking for one or more software programs to create a sphere in 3D with longitudes, latitudes, etc. I want to be able ...
5
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1answer
185 views

Rock layers in Procedural Map Creation

I've been working on a procedural map generator for a strategy game (if I ever get to gameplay). My general development philosophy is "believable but not necessarily realistic", in other words I don't ...
6
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3answers
202 views

Is my biome/climate map realistic?

just looking for a quick accuracy check of my continent's biome/climate map. This continent is on a planet much like Earth and it is about the size of Eurasia. It is situated in the southern ...
2
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2answers
238 views

do these mountains look to be in realistic locations?

I'm getting into mapmaking, which I enjoy, but some of the specifics of realism still elude me. I know generally how plate tectonics work, but I was hoping to get some help on a specific example. I ...
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19answers
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What would influence an alien race to map their planet in a way other than the traditional map of the Earth

I was looking through a bunch of different ways we can shape a map of the Earth and it got me thinking. We map out planet as a stretched rectangle with NSEW as Up Down Right Left, with the Equator ...
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3answers
1k views

How to name places that have multiple names?

When designing a world it is convenient to decide how places will be named: Elements like the continents and the oceans. However, it is likely that the different cultures of the world will not agree ...
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4answers
5k views

Less boring classifications of earth-like terrain when making maps

When creating a map for a fantasy world, I typically add broad top-level descriptions for terrain. Mountains here, forests there, a river, a swamp etc. Watch any nature documentary, and each terrain ...
0
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1answer
82 views

How many towns could a smallish island have? [closed]

So basically for background purposes the story is set on an island so I don't have to deal with the rest of the world. But anyways, it is drawing on nordic and celtic mythology and technology, so ...
0
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1answer
121 views

Would a medieval world use the word “trail” to describe a foot path?

I'm in the process of naming some routes and roads in my medieval fantasy themed world, and I want to specify routes that could only be managed on foot. I'm tempted to say trails, but since every body ...
8
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1answer
930 views

What is the best digital way to make maps with different projections?

I am trying to make a digital world map (preferably vector graphic but it's definitely not essential) for my planet but I don't know which projection to use and how to go about actually making it. I ...
7
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2answers
1k views

How do I calculate the area of a specific place on the map?

Technical question warning ! I'm trying to figure out the size of countries and continents but there is something I do not understand. The map I'm using was made with the equirectangular projection (...
7
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1answer
245 views

What are the most useful projection types for my world map?

As my presence on here may imply, I am creating a story, and am currently working on the worldbuilding side of operations. One of the things I am trying to do is get a good map going, as my brain is ...
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8answers
2k views

Drawing Maps; flat distortion

One of my main problems when it comes to drawing maps is how landmasses get distorted at different points. One of the continents in my story stretches almost to the north pole, but it looked very ...
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0answers
147 views

Resulting clime of fictional world geography [closed]

I'm writing a fantasy story, and I've recently come up with a world map. This probably isn't the final version (I'll probably add some more islands), but this gives me a general idea of where ...
6
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1answer
412 views

Can Someone Help Me Determine Plate Divisions?

I have a world designed called Ser. I want to place tectonic plates so that they can explain how the current landmasses formed. Below shows the 6 major continents of the world. As continents are ...
4
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1answer
444 views

How Can I Draw a Realistic Topographic Map?

I have a planet I created. I have the water and land boundaries, and I have the important mountain ranges, forests, and deserts defined. Now that I've done this, I want to turn my cartoony world map ...
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17answers
46k views

Best places to be on Earth when an all out nuclear World War III breaks out?

This is a world building question in a preventative context because those people or countries would be left fully functional while others gone and the safe areas is where the world building would ...
2
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1answer
405 views

Does my climate map work?

I'm looking for notes on my climate map for a continent I've mapped out. Does this set up seem plausible. Map (Imgur) [3 Previous question with general planetary conditions edit Don't have time ...
3
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1answer
143 views

Biomes and landscaping this odd-shaped planet (part 2)

I'm still working on world map of this pear-shaped planet for my alien race, so I think land-to-water ratio would be something 40/60% or 30/70% (I don't know which one makes creatures much bigger), ...
6
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2answers
373 views

Rotating a map projection - software question

Not a duplicate of What software is available for map creation? as the focus is on how, not what -- requesting useful projections for a polar context, and techniques to transform between projections ...

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