Antaios

[Rahva]

Or, well, it's not the name of the world, but me and a friend are writing the story that fits this map and that has no title (we just call it the Dutch version of The Thing) so we refer to the world as the Thingy World, which just doesn't sound too cool as a title.

As you can see it's not yet done.
The country Antaios is a joint effort from me and her; it's where most of the story takes place.
Krithin is Elf-land, and it's her domain which is why it's mostly still empty city-wise. The forest texture was a spur of the moment but I kind of like it.
Issil'Hathaynn is Dark Elf land, which I'm responsible for fleshing out and I feel I might have gone overboard a bit (in addition to this I have pages of backstory and names, and the story will probably only go there once).

I'm not too sure about the desert in the south (yup it's a desert), but in the current version it's a bit more on the yellow side than in this image. That's really the only difference, so I didn't think it worth my time to sit there and wait 5 minutes while the file opens just so I can save it

Anyway, any comments would be appreciated.

[Hoel]

Elves...
I banned elves from all my campaigns years ago.
Say they're nice and nasty orcs or something instead, and I'm on board!

Seriously. Nice map. Good colors, except the white desert. Perhaps a salt desert?
I don't see why you gone overboard. An old GM saying "There is no possible way to ever have enough material prepared, enough named characters or enough mapped areas".

[Rahva]

We're trying to make the Elves tolerable compared to Tolkien Elves The normal Elves are 90% arrogant assholes who think they can boss the other races around cause they know best. They've got their people in most Human courts now. They're definitely not as girly and treehuggy, they just happen to live in a forest so they do have that reputation among the other races. Humans and Elves have been at war for a while over some border disputes that dragged on. That's mostly over now, but plenty of Humans still hate Elves and the other way around.
The Dark Elves aren't evil cruel marauding raiders/pirates, they're usually quite reasonable, especially towards foreigners and they mostly focus on their own overcomplicated politics and ambitions and traditions.

Also, Elves drink like Dwarves. Dark Elves go into liver failure from alcohol, so they have some form of opium to intoxicate themselves.

*end of rant*

Edit: SG, what sort of font would you recommend then?

[Gandwarf]

Very nice start Rahva, I like the colors and the mountains. The font isn't doing anything for me, though.
(update: after I made my comment I noticed Steel General made the same remark. Can't really help you with the font, I only use one Celtic font for all my maps together with Verdana).

Elves...
I banned elves from all my campaigns years ago.
Say they're nice and nasty orcs or something instead, and I'm on board!

As you know I am doing a lot of writing as well and all the standard Tolkien races are firmly banned. No elves, dwarves, orcs, goblins, etc. I can't stand to read about elves other than in Tolkien's work somehow

[Rahva]

My own original works usually only feature humans now, for example the first map I ever posted here only has humans and a couple of mostly harmless undead and a creator-species in the deep recesses of history. The map I submitted for the contest only has humans and some wandering monsters. I"ve had some settings with different races but they've usually been of my own creation. This particular Thingy World came into existence... seven or eight years ago now. So a lot of it is firmly lodged in teenage escapism/Mary-Sueism. But it's a lot of fun.

I can stand Elves, usually, and I kind of hate Tolkien's elves...

I usually leave Dwarves alone, in DnD and in writing, except as a source for some nice adventuring ruins. I can only do the stereotypical "Ymer Knee-Gnawer, Son of Ymer Groin-Headbutter" (who was actually an NPC in a DnD campaign I ran a while ago, and it sounds triple awesome in Dutch), the Dwarf that swings an axe, is grumpy, hates Elves and drinks loads.

I don't like Orcs. If I need a feral evil race I make up my own and they're usually just primitive humans. Same for Goblins.

I like the DnD Halflings and I respect Tolkien Hobbits but that's where it stops.

Incidentally, here is a map. I'm still playing around with the levels of the colours.

[Steel General]

Love the background/ocean color really helps to draw the eye to the land areas.

My only negative, and this really is more a matter of preference than any kind of knock on your work, is the script font. For me it just doesn't work for this kind of map.

[Steel General]

As far as the font goes it really is a matter of preference. Script fonts certainly have their place in maps, I'm just not a big fan of them as I find them difficult to read at times.

You may want to try one of the more 'handwritten' fonts to see how it looks. *shrugs*

[Strickland5]

You might want to change the color of your text as some of it is difficult to read due to it being over mountains and such


Otherwise cool map!

[Rahva]

Yeah Strickland, I'm gonna be making the text more legible. But I'll do that after all the text is in place, so that I only have to do it once

[Bohunk]

Love the colors and the "paper" texture. As for fonts, I get all mine here http://www.abstractfonts.com there are thousands.