The Empire of Dor-en-Sann

[Robulous]

This is a map of the Empire of Dor-en-Sann on my continent of Anasthias - it's a historic empire in my fantasy timeline which collapsed about 1200 years ago but was the greatest power in its day.

To its people much of the rest of the continent was unexplored mountain and forest, peopled only by barbarian tribes.

Still WIP so comments/thoughts/suggestions appreciated. Thanks!

dorensann v1.png

[Mark Oliva]

Not so much a comment or a suggestion as a question ... do the colors represent anything in particular?

[Robulous]

Sort of, but good point it's not clear enough what represents what. I intended on going for a very limited colour palette but yes it needs to be much clearer, thanks.

[Mark Oliva]

OK. I'm curious. I'll keep watching.

[DanielHasenbos]

Just what I was going to say. The map looks great but perhaps you could use a bit more yellow and red tones. Otherwise this is looking great!
-Dan

[Robulous]

So here's draft 2. I drew in some mountains and jungle, prettied up the frame, added a scale and latitude/longitude and tinkered with the colours a little. It's hard to have any kind of colour scheme for the nations - the Empire is one bloc but made up of several constituent states, and the surrounding nations are all separate. So there's slight shading just to distinguish them, but they don't represent anything.


dorensann v2.png

[Mark Oliva]

I like the clean design of this map. The colors still interest me. Don't misunderstand me; I have no problem with them at all and mean nothing negative. But I'm curious why you chose these colors. It's not an everyday map look.

[hireshmontvellos]

I like both the colors and the simplicity, but I'm not sure it conveys much actual information.

[Robulous]

I like both the colors and the simplicity, but I'm not sure it conveys much actual information.

What information would you like it to convey?

[hireshmontvellos]

Anything! Cities, or roads, or terrain. I have no idea from this map what the Empire of Dor-en-Saan is like, what its major landforms and cities may be, etc. Are there no landforms worth mentioning?

This is a very, very cool image, but I'm not sure it's accomplishing much actual mapping, in the sense that it does not in fact provide visualizations for a very large amount of geospatial information.

I hope that doesn't come across as harsh; I really do think it's a beautiful piece of work, and I dig the pre-Hellenistic vibe I'm getting from it. That's really an under-used historical motif I think. But I look at it and find that it doesn't really satisfy very much of my curiosity about what this place actually is.