Fourth Age of Middle-earth WIP

[michael.harrel]

Hey all,

I'm currently running a campaign of The One Ring RPG set about 200 years after the Lord of the Rings, and while I love the official maps from the game, they've only really covered the area of Mirkwood and Eriador so far. Other, more complete maps like Peter Fenlon's brilliant maps for Middle Earth Roleplaying were unfortunately too tied to earlier time periods. So, I decided to make my own. I've detailed quite a bit about my early thoughts going into the project, as well as a step-by-step description of my process on one of the regions, over on my Tumblr, but essentially my requirements boiled down to:

• Set in the Fourth Age
• Large enough to show detail comparable to the existing One Ring maps or the old MERP maps
• Able to exist in both Adventurer’s Map and Loremaster’s Map versions, as in the One Ring
• As faithful as possible to Tolkien’s writings and vision…
• …but also allowing for exploration in areas where Tolkien was silent
• High enough in quality to impress my players

Here's where the map is currently:



(A larger version is available at my dropbox)

I'm slowly moving out of canon lands and into the MERP/fanon lands. Any comments or suggestions would be most welcome!

[michael.harrel]

FourthAgeV3-Adventurers.jpg

A quick update, this time moving southwards into the Near Harad area.

[xcorps]

You really nailed the look. It shows progress from the MERP maps (which I loved) and keeps the taste.

So well done.

[Ilanthar]

Looks like an interesting idea, and a very good map so far.

[SapperWolf]

Great Job... I also am working on a late 4th or beginning 5th D&D campaign. Hard to find info on Middle-Earth past the Ring.

[tilt]

Looks pretty cool, it does remind me of the maps from MERP ... The city names seems a bit dominating in the map, detracting from the overall look of the 'nature' as your eyes are distracted by labels, maybe you could try something a bit more discreet? And yes, I know you got a lot of them..

[Galendae]

I like this very much! I missed it 1st time thru. Well done!

[Robulous]

Nice. What happened to all the orcs?