Critique Please

[BJWhittington]

My first attempt.

This is a map for my fantasy novel.

I welcome all critiques and suggestions.
10-19GMap.gif

[Triplicate]

Welcome!

Interesting shape for a landmass. I can't help thinking of Australia every time I see that peninsula at top right.

Ooh, glacial lakes! And a clear NW-SE axis for the movement of glaciers, too.

Weeping Lake isn't a lake, though. On Earth, we have a "sea" that's technically a lake, but I can't think of any examples where the naming is inaccurate in the other direction.

People are going to start criticizing those rivers immediately. The western lakes are connected by rivers, but with no outlet to the sea. The main eastern river appears to have been overlaid arbitrarily; there's something unconvincing about how it connects to the lakes.

What do green, lime and gray shading signify?

[Lingon]

Welcome to the Guild!

Looking great for a first attempt. Nice textures and interesting lakes. Like Triplicate, I thought of Australia immediately, and the fjords in the northwest looks very similar to a part of Norway's coast… If these associations were not intentional, you might want to play around with the shapes a little to break the similarities.

Your rivers are mostly correct, in that they flow from high ground into the sea, but I think they could be more squiggly to look more natural.

I have to disagree about Triplicate's point about the "lake"; the Baltic Sea for example is called Östersjön in Swedish, meaning literally "Eastern Lake", so Weeping Lake not a bad name at all. In fact, I like it.

[Llannagh]

Welcome from me too!

I have not a lot to add. I'm guessing the scale on this is quite big? If so, you should think about how to spread the different landscapes out a bit and add more variety. This way it seems there are only two large foresty areas and a very huge swamp/grassland area.
I like the coastline a lot, though Lingon's point about norway is true. Also, if this is big scaled, you should add more detail to those straight bits of coast.

But as a general layout this is pretty nice so far.

[Ilanthar]

That's a good start.

My guess is : mix between Australia and scandinavia, with the lofoten and north coast of Norway in the NE, the gulf of Botnia in the middle and the Finland coast on the south west. I kinda like that because I used to do the same : mixing some earth parts to obtain a nice landshape with a "believable" feeling
In fact, I'm still using that kind of inspiration, but more with the paleogeological maps.

As Triplicate, I'm wondering what is the meaning of your gray shading.

[BJWhittington]

PalmirMap.gif

I have been working on this, tweaking a bit more.

Yes, I did "mix parts" to get the basic outline.

Yes, the scale will end up big, it is a continent roughly ½ the width of the United States.

"WHEW" this is a lot more difficult than I thought it would be!

[Viking]

Welcome to the guild first off! In regards to lakes, I would say that there are many bodies with no outlet to the ocean but that's okay as long as you realize that in the real world this would cause the body of water to become highly salinated. The map overall is nice. Some of your labels could be a little clearer by some slight repositioning to give their letters more clearance from what is under them. For example if you moved Sendiaville a touch north it that lake under it wouldn't be touching the i, a and v.

[Triplicate]

With Weeping Lake now being endorheic, I wonder if it got its name from being salty like tears...

[BJWhittington]

With Weeping Lake now being endorheic, I wonder if it got its name from being salty like tears...

This is for my Dragons in the Mist series, according to the storyline, Weeping Lake was re-named to that after the incursion of creatures that wiped out 75% of the human population and all of the dragonkind (Who were allies of the humans). It was the site of the largest death count in the battles.

But, as others have pointed out here, I need to feed a river to the ocean or it will be salty too...