Pathfinder Maps

This morning I ordered my big prints from Banners on the Cheap of Ansaera and Westerlands! A 2x2 tabletop/game mat map and a 3x6 wall hanger with grommets for under $40 (including shipping). What a steal of a deal. Their 30% off sale is still going until next Tuesday 11/20, so you better hurry if you want to save on your awesomely mappy early Christmas present.

And speaking of wall hangers, I think I'm up to 2 dozen maps from various Pathfinder map folios from the brush of one Rob Lazzaretti. Sadly I don't have the wall space to hang them all in my Nerdatorium and what space I do have is going to get rearranged and gobbled up with my banner maps get delivered. Next time I'll post pics of what the Nerdatorium currently looks like and then I'll post more after I make the switcheroo.

In the mean time, here's a look at some of the Pathfinder maps that adorn the walls of yours truly.

http://paizo.com/paizo/blog/tags/maps

Start at the bottom of the page and go up to get to the goodies.

I love how simple and colorful the maps are without making things appear too cartoony. I want my adventures to take place in medieval/fantasy towns and villages, not the Disney theme park version of a medieval/fantasy town or village. I like the ambiance of dwarves and halflings wandering about with brigands and sell swords, not Snow White and Mickey glad handing 5 year olds.

With Disney owning Hasbro (which includes WotC/D&D), Marvel, and Lucasarts now, I'm sure it's only a matter of time until Pathfinder is under the corporate umberella. At what point does a corporation become an imperium?

Know Thyself aka Seek Immediate Professional Help

Know thyself. As a person and as a writer. It makes for better characters, better dialogue, better stories, a better you. 

I am on Holly Lisle's weekly email list and I've never been disappointed with the topics. The emails themselves are simple in nature, the goal being to teach you how to make you a better writer. Each is a few paragraphs, usually with several resource links, and the subjects are always thought provoking.

She recently did a multi-part string of emails that made you step back and really consider "you". Your flaws, fears, hopes, dreams, scars, lessons learned, etc. It's not just about that introspection that we all need sometimes, the focus is to get you in tune with those things and drive you to put them on the page. You don't have to be writing an autobiography to inject those deeply personal touches, you can work them into characters and conversations. Maybe you never learned to swim, so your character can't. Maybe you almost drowned and so your character has a paralyzing fear of deep water. Spiders, snakes, fire...q-tips. Who knows?

Your character be could fearful of anything for nearly any reason. Even worse, what if they're irrationally afraid of everything? How do they deal with their bizarre compulsions? Can they? Perhaps they must be medicated everyday, the degree to which they are doped is entirely up to you. Do they take a simple pill each morning? Is it an injection that must be administered by someone else? What if part of their phobia is needles, but there is no other way to get the dose? These are all things to consider. They're a normal, every day person with the help of the meds......but then what if they lose that oh so important little bottle?

You can really run with it. Maybe they have just lost their job and don't have the money for the prescription. They changed jobs and their new insurance won't take effect for 90 days. Perhaps the new insurance doesn't have drug coverage at all, or doesn't pay for their usual rx and now they have to change medications. Or they have moved to a completely new area and need to find a new doctor to prescribe. The search is proving difficult and the increased stress of the move and a new home and job are taking their toll. New symptoms begin to manifest. They are becoming more and more delusional, suffering from intense anxiety, hallucinating. I could go on and on, but I think that's enough.

Fantasy Worlds

Yet another awesome share from my Gandalf. 

Planetocopia is one of the best complete world(s) sites I've seen because the maker, Chris Wayan, doesn't just do it because he loves it, but he can explain in great depth why he does it and loves it. His worlds are crafted with great precision, and if there is a hiccup/hole, he can account for it. Whether you're after theoretical worlds, ancient, future, would-be Earth, or even alien worlds with multiple moons, this has them all!

I especially like Jaredia because it's based entirely on the concepts of Guns, Germs, and Steel a book I meant to read for years and years. It was suggested by professors and friends alike, and wouldn't you know, as soon as I bought it and started reading...the 3 part documentary version was loaded on Netflix. Win, win.

This wondrous resource pairs especially nicely with the donjon fractal world generator because it handily explains the whys, hows, and pitfalls of the generated world maps.

If you're like me and "grounded" fantasy on one Earth-like world suits you, or whether you want a smattering of worlds for a vast Traveller system, this will serve your needs.

A Reply Regarding Printed Maps

Yet another great email reply from Banners on the Cheap

Greetings Realmwright,

Very, very cool!!! Thank you so much for sharing this with me and for sharing our info with your audience. We truly appreciate the free advertising!!

I can't wait to find out how your maps turn out!! I've bookmarked your page so I can check it out at a later date. We'd love to see photos of your maps in action, of course, when you find the room to hang them in your nerdatorium!

I hope Santa treats you well and crosses this off the wish list!!

Just today we started a sale on our banners which will be good through November 20th to get 30% off!! I couldn't find you on our mailing list so I've forwarded this email to you, it's a click through promotion so if you are able to buy by the expiration date you want to head to our site by clicking through the link in the email so it will apply the discount.

Hope this helps!! Thanks again for sharing!!

Have fantastic gaming day!

Melissa Mcquiston
Customer Love Team
www.bannersonthecheap.com
1-877-710-1876
M-F 7AM-9PM Central
Saturday 9AM-6PM Central

Printed Fantasy Maps At A Good Price

 I came across a great post/recommendation for printed maps from Banners on the Cheap.com

As you can see from Zachary Houghton's post on his blog RPG Blog II he scored a vinyl 3 x 5 wall hanging map for under $28. That sounded pretty sweet to me, so I shot them an email asking if I could order a few of my own and any limitations that may apply.

Their lovely "Customer Love" (mind you, not just plain old 'customer service') team sent me a reply the next business day which read:

Greetings Realmwright,

Good afternoon & thank you for your inquiry!

WOW! There must definitely be a trend going on with these map banners!! What a wonderful idea, I've seen quite a few of these creations lately!

You can certainly order the images you want, the only restriction is that we cannot print images that have a watermark on them.

Hope this helps! Let me know if you need any additional assistance!

Have a great day!

Thanks for choosing us for your printing needs, we know you have many options for printing and we are glad you have chosen us.

Melissa Mcquiston
Customer Love Team
www.bannersonthecheap.com

How's that for service? Prompt, courteous, enthusiastic, and all at a great price! Needless to say I will start saving my pennies for my own wall hangers. They will be the Ansaera and Westerlands maps I previously posted (with permission from the artists, of course). Now I just have to find more wall space in my nerdatorium...

NaGaDeMon

NaNoWriMo kicked off Wednesday. Sadly I never received any requests for worldbuilding assistance, but I suppose there is still the chance someone will get stuck and reach out. Whether they ask me directly or not, I hope my blog can give them good info and resources, and best of luck.

Along the same lines of November being the "official" month for creative ventures, I recently learned of NaGaDeMon from Enderra.com

NaGaDeMon.com

Through the NaGaDeMon site I found this link. 

FREE RPG Blog

I'd have to straighten out a few other projects in life before time would allow me to begin gaming, but it's nice to know freebies like these exist so you don't have to drop a lot of money to get started. 

Oh the Weather Outside is Frightful....

I hail donjon as one of the most complete gennies I've come across in my years of worldbuilding. I've linked to it before, but I'd like to refer to it again, particularly the random weather generator

Personally I use the weather almost as its own character. At the time I'm drafting this post there is a massive scramble underway in NYC for the monster storm. School is cancelled, public transport is shut down, the harbor is closed, they're afraid the subways will flood, it's even managed to dampen (pun intended) a rather heated presidential campaign. So for the city that never sleeps to come to a grinding halt is a BIG deal.

**Update: the 900 mile wide civilization-drowning blight on the Eastern US of A (aka Hurricane Sandy) is responsible for 11-14 foot swells making landfall in NYC, resulting in thigh deep water on the surface streets, the complete flooding of 7 subway tunnels under the East River, and countless millions of dollars in property damage. Oh yeah and the largest scale blackout of the greatest city on Earth since 2003.

Rain in Seattle, smog in LA, neon lights in Las Vegas, every city has its staple environment - use that to the fullest. Or like with New York, that is no stranger to hard winters, a torrential rain can really throw things for a loop. What if it didn't rain in Seattle? How would the Emerald City handle an unexpected drought? I live way up in the Rocky Mountains where yearly drought is a concern when the winter doesn't give us enough snow. Everyone talks about the impending, doomsday earthquake we call "the Big One" that's expected to level the city. But get people talking about strange weather and two things are sure to come up: the flood of 1983 and the tornado that ripped through downtown in 1999. Very rare and memorable things. Work something like that into whatever setting. Is the storm raging now and everyone is stuck inside, or is it darkening the horizon? Were people adequately warned and prepared, or is it panic mode to grab what is left on the shelves? Or do your characters arrive as some of the first travel allowed back into the city and everything is a disaster area?

Let's say your road weary travelers didn't heed the advice of a local druid's forecast and supplied themselves for only a 5 day trek, which took a turn for the worse and became a 12 day harrowing plod. Because a freak blizzard struck and halted forward progress they had to take shelter in a none-too-splendid inn. The innkeeper swindles them on the price of the tiny room, which has its share of bedbugs, rats, a draft around the window, and a leaky roof. The proprietor knows as well as the adventurers that it's their only option. Either pay top dollar for the shabby digs, or it's back out into the snow and blow. How do they deal with that speed bump? Do they blame their intrepid leader who passed on the sage advice in order to get on the road? Do they bicker amongst themselves about whose turn it is to stoke the fire and empty the chamberpot? Maybe they have to hold members back from throttling the innkeeper and ending up in the local dungeon, for which they have no bail money. And go!

See? This alone is a story (or game session). It really doesn't matter where they were coming from, or their destination.