River placement help

[darkfaterpg]

I'm attaching the most recent map here.

The idea for this map is an attempt at a "hexploring" game, focused mainly on the wilderness of a recently found new land. Comments and criticisms are welcome!

I've kept the first draft in order to allow everyone to see how the map has improved since I've begun to receive some help here. ;-)

Greetings,

I've toying with a map I'd like to see finished, but I'm still not too satisfied with it. It'll be a hex map meant for roleplaying use in the end, but I've tried to make it as pretty as possible so far.

Yet, I'm not sure where the rivers could be placed. I have a general idea, but I've never tried to think about it considering the 'real life geography'.

So, in fact, I'm not only asking for help regarding the rivers, but on the general aspect of the map. I'd consider sacrificing a bit of reality in order to have an interesting map to be explored, but I can not rely simply on the 'it's magic' answer for everything.

The map scale is roughly 1 hex = 1 day of travel on foot. This is purposely left a bit vague as I don't want to write a single line on stone yet.

By the way, I'd like to thank RobA for the field-like patterns I'm using (http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...-like-patterns) and also for the great tutorial about artistic regional maps (http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...gional-RPG-Map).

[Gidde]

The easiest way to make rivers in the right place is to start at a mountain range and go toward the ocean, getting curvier as you leave the highlands. Then once you have that main "trunk" you can start making smaller and smaller branches that leave it and go toward other parts of the mountains. Just make sure all your branches are on the mountain side, as rivers join as they go toward the ocean. Do that until you have sufficient drainage for the snowmelt coming off all the mountains and you'll look natural.

[darkfaterpg]

But where do the rivers start forming in that map? I don't have a clue about the areas that could contain enough water to start the flow of the river.

[Rhotherian]

Where it rains and/or snows alot. Don't start too high up the mountains, as it'll be too cold for liquid water up there. Don't start where melt water will accumilate into streams either. Start your rivers where the streams will be large enough to be notable on a map. In other words, don't start your rivers where they start, start them where they'd be more than a trickle.

[Redrobes]

Maybe this will help...

http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...he-right-place

[darkfaterpg]

That helped a bit, as I've searched all the forums before asking my question. The problem is I don't see the exact places where the water should accumulate before forming rivers. I was thinking about installing Wilbur and trying to see if something good could come from that, but before doing that (after all, at work I can't install a single thing) I decided to ask for help.

[Ascension]

The problem is the haphazard placement of the mountains. Yours seem to be like islands popping up here n there instead of being formed by geological process and tectonics...ie they are mountain chains not mountain archipelagos. Here's a quick sketch I did; black is where I would expect a mountain chain and supporting foothills and red is the rivers based on your current mountains (they are only half done but they give you an idea).

[darkfaterpg]

The problem is the haphazard placement of the mountains. Yours seem to be like islands popping up here n there instead of being formed by geological process and tectonics...ie they are mountain chains not mountain archipelagos. Here's a quick sketch I did; black is where I would expect a mountain chain and supporting foothills and red is the rivers based on your current mountains (they are only half done but they give you an idea).

Thanks for the sketch--it was a great help, as now I see how the rivers should work.

Now, regarding my mountains, I do have a question: would such placement be unfeasible? I really want to have a nice diversity of terrains in my map (including desert, that's why I've enclosed it on a mountain/hill circle, as that was the only way I've found to really have it on the map). The large chain you've sketched seems natural (a lot more than my 'popped mountains'), but I don't see it as an evironmental challenge to be explored. The main utility of this map should be as a setting to wilderness exploration, and I'd be willing to sacrifice some (not all) of the real placement in order to see an interesting place to be explored.

[Juggernaut1981]

Try this as a solution.
DesertMockup.jpg

[Ascension]

Well, what's the scale? You mentioned hexes but there aren't any yet. If this is an island you could squeeze in some diversity...if it were a huge island like Madagascar but in a temperate climate. If this is a continent then everything is fair game...all diversity is possible. I'd cut the mountain chain in the middle then and scale back the ends. Gimme a scale and I'll resketch ya something.