The Kingdom of Angust - Home of the Dwarf Lords

[Kuragiman]

Tools: Photoshop CS5 and my trusty Wacom 9 x 12 Intuos Tablet
Time to Complete: Two Weeks

Background: The kingdom of Angust, like it's northern neighbor Lazarus, was comprised of provinces belonging to the dark empire of Morthul and they declared themselves independent and free from the tyranny of Emperor Baurom III's heavy hand at the same time the provinces that made up Lazarus did. Just like Lazarus, perhaps even worse, the Emperor's wrath was brutal and thousands upon thousands of civilians were butchered for their treason and those that survived the invasion by Morthul were forced to flee east into the neighboring kingdom of Ralenstara. The brutal slaughtering of common folk in both Angust and Lazarus is what would eventually bring the powerful kingdom of Ralenstara into conflict with Morthul and kick off one of the longest bloodiest wars in the history of the Til-Gathiel. There are many battlegrounds strewn across the landscape of Angust as it was a hotly contest stretch of land during the great war. Ultimately the Emperor agreed to a peace treaty with Ralaenstara and gave Lazarus and Angust their freedom, paid for in much bloodshed.

When the cursed gate of Ruhadalaum opened wide to flood the world with all manners of beast, monsters and the other races that now call Elvanrill home, Angust would ultimately become a piece of historic legend as the mountainous terrain attracted many of the great dragons during the War of Scales (circa 200 A.G.) and would play host to the many battles fought between the Dragonborn forces of the Dwarvish led Dragonstalker army. The fierce courageous warriors would ultimately force the dragons to seek easier pray north and secure a peace that managed to survive to present day, even through the Plague of Varsuna (circa 450 A.G.).

As of year 956 A.G., Angust enjoys relative peace but is ever watchful of Morthul to the west. Dwarves, having no more battles to fight, settled down and claimed the Questhold mountains as their own and dug deep into it's core, establishing the city of Stonehurn where rigorous trade is done with all the races of the kingdom and with the other kingdoms abroad. The human city of Ozyren grew into a massive metropolis and proclaimed itself the capital of Angust though there is no centralized ruler. The provinces that once made up the Morthulian landscape remained pretty much the same, each one governing itself and trying to remain on good terms with their neighbors. It is a system that has so far worked. Ralenstara has pumped millions in treasure to help keep the region stable as the entire straight acts as a buffer zone with their most hated enemy, Morthul, and they wish it to remain so.

(c) 2011 Brian D. Navy

Angust-Final.jpg
CC.png

[Clercon]

Very nice and a lot of details. My only nitpik would be that the red labels for battles is a bit strong compared to the rest of the map.

[Eilathen]

Wow, i really dig that map. Very well done, have some rep.!
Is there more of this world? With maps and history? If yes, i'd really like to see and read it

[Kuragiman]

Wow, i really dig that map. Very well done, have some rep.!
Is there more of this world? With maps and history? If yes, i'd really like to see and read it

Yes. This is a world I have been creating for the last 15 years and I finally have the skills to bring the map part of it to life which will make writing the several novels I have planned (and hopefully will get published one day) out much easier. If you know where you are going it's so much easier to get there.

There are 7 kingdoms in all
====================
Ralenstara - This map will probably take my entire life because the kingdom is the size of Africa and I want to keep the scales between all my maps the same so it will be huge, well over 6000px.
Morthul - Can't wait to work on this one. This is where all the bad folks live.
Valentor - This one will be fun to do because it will be my first attempt at doing tundra like terrain.
Korian - This dead kingdom will be a challenge because of the damage done to it.
Lazarus - Completed!
Angust - This map!
Japhong - My next project. The island kingdom of Japhong is where all my Asian like cultures live.

Here is the ENTIRE planet done roughly in Fractal Terrain 3. I wanted to build the maps using this software and the amazing tutorials I found on here but ultimately I just couldn't get the land to look how I wanted. I am too much of a control freak. Fractal Terrain 3 is great for random world generation but in my opinion, if you have a fixed setting that you already know what you want to look like it is more hassle to use than help. Maybe I just don't know what I am doing but ultimately, since I know how to use Photoshop on an expert level I choose to go that route. Fractal Terrains was EXTREMELY useful though in getting the size of my world correct and all the kingdoms.

World-Map.JPG

[Eilathen]

Cool stuff! Thanks for sharing, Kuragiman. I am looking forward to the rest of the maps. And if you want to share and write up the world-information on here, even better. I am always interested to see what worlds other minds come up with
Concerning the world map: so you'll be doing an own worldmap? You're not satisfied with the FT version?
Btw, i have already spotted where Lazarus and Angust are placed on it. So i guess the map can't be that bad

[Kuragiman]

Cool stuff! Thanks for sharing, Kuragiman. I am looking forward to the rest of the maps. And if you want to share and write up the world-information on here, even better. I am always interested to see what worlds other minds come up with
Concerning the world map: so you'll be doing an own worldmap? You're not satisfied with the FT version?
Btw, i have already spotted where Lazarus and Angust are placed on it. So i guess the map can't be that bad

The way I created what I did in FT is I took a really crappy old map I did in photoshop about ten years ago and I made an overlay out of it in FT. And then went in and hand carved away all the land where the water was suppose to be then did some erosion scripts to build coast lines and this is what I got. Ultimately though, getting mountains to be mountains and flat lands to be flat was too much hassale at the scale I wanted to work with. It seems FT does to much "wiggling" in flat area producing rough terrain where you don't want it. The developer told me on here that is just how it does it's thing. I don't have the patience to sit there and scrape a little bit here and there and then wait for it to render. If the software could do the changes in real time it would be amazing... like working on a sculpture, chipping away the pieces here and there but fractal software can't do that. It has to recalculate all the points after ever change.

FT is a great program and did help me get things in the right place and I have seen some INCREDIBLE maps done with it but my understanding of how people got them to look like that in FT (using wilbur here and there) is just beyond my brain's ability to understand.

I am glad you were able to spot the two kingdoms I have already mapped. Means I did something right.

[Veldehar]

I agree with you Fractal Terrains... just not designed for recreating an existing world, but it is handy for scale and whatnot. Excellent work, look forward to seeing more of this world.

[The Goblin's Lair]

Nice work Kuragiman! I really like the way you presented the locations on the map, short & sweet, and accurate. I agree the red for the battles draws you in a bit, but I liked the idea of labeling them with the dates. Good job!

[Needamedic]

I really like what you have presented so far. I for one like the battleground font. I am waiting patiently for more on this setting.