Guild City - Overall Map

[djan]

Somehow I missed this thread, but this going to be cool! Thanks Redrobes.

I want to start on my part now, ... but first finish my challenge map...

[DarkInfinity]

I want to start on my part now, ... but first finish my challenge map...

Yes, I have been neglecting my monthly challenge as well... need to get back on that 12 more days ish...

If you go up a level to the Community World Build Projects section there is a bunch of topics there. One of them is the zoomable map of GuildCity. GuildCity is one of hundreds of cities within GuildWorld. In the community topics there is a zoom map of Guild World too. If you use that and zoom around and find the bottom right sandy coloured section of the main continent then when you zoom in a little ways you will find an icon which is where GuildCity lives on the whole world. If you click that icon it takes you to GuildCity the zoomable map.

Were hoping that we can have some sections within GuildCity with some more links so that we can zoom in some more. Maybe have a sewers / underground layer and maybe some links to threads which contain the interior maps for some of the buildings. My personal hope is that we could build a world and map some of it to a level where you could easily RPG in it without having the overhead of massive mapping ordeal to go through. Once it reaches a certain threshold then I would hope that people using it to RPG might add to it progressively - or add background ideas and campaign notes to the world to flesh it out.

Thats the plan anyway ! Whether we can pull it off is basically dependent on how well it goes or how popular it becomes.

Well, I do have a cave underneath my section I need to map out eventually... as far as how well it goes/ popularity I'm putting my vote for an annual/ semi-annual/ biannual (not sure how often people will be ready for something like this) event for picking a city or area to do a community event to map out. The options are (almost) endless. We could map out caves in one of the mountain ranges, buildings within the cities, even different cities with different angles (some cities could be smaller so we get a smaller section so maybe have an angled view for more details instead of top down.) Along with being fun, it gets people to try different styles of mapping as well. Pushing our boundaries. Perhaps I am getting ahead of myself... just some food for thought.

[Falconius]

Well, I do have a cave underneath my section I need to map out eventually... as far as how well it goes/ popularity I'm putting my vote for an annual/ semi-annual/ biannual (not sure how often people will be ready for something like this) event for picking a city or area to do a community event to map out. The options are (almost) endless. We could map out caves in one of the mountain ranges, buildings within the cities, even different cities with different angles (some cities could be smaller so we get a smaller section so maybe have an angled view for more details instead of top down.) Along with being fun, it gets people to try different styles of mapping as well. Pushing our boundaries. Perhaps I am getting ahead of myself... just some food for thought.

Yeah, that was also discussed in the Guild world threads, and it would be nice perhaps to set up something slightly formal like that. This occurrence happened more organically then a planned event. Perhaps in the challenge suggestion threads one could also put up guild world suggestions for a semi-annual (assuming that's the one that means twice a year?) mapping project. Alternatively people could put up three poll options on their suggestions: "Yes." "No." and "GuildWorld project"?

Edit: For instance we could have a group Guild dungeon, which would be extensive and super cool I think.

[DarkInfinity]

@Mouse - There is nothing wrong with leaving things the way they are, it was just a suggestion for a more structured event (I like structure more than others I'm ok with that )

@RedRobes - I did see mention in one of the other threads about the work that goes into the zoomable maps (I'm a software engineer, programmer, code monkey whatever you want to call it) So learning about the process involved there does sound fun to me. If you ever do a tutorial, please let me know (or is there one in the tutorial section already?). I'm sure I could figure it out or find a tutorial somewhere else, but there is a difference learning from some random site and learning from a person you know does something and does it well.

General question - should we move the discussion of suggestions to another thread? I didn't mean for it to eat up this thread.

[Mouse]

@Mouse - There is nothing wrong with leaving things the way they are, it was just a suggestion for a more structured event (I like structure more than others I'm ok with that )

LOL! You and I are opposite in that sense. I come here to get away from structures. I find they limit my spontaneity and creativity, but then I've always been a bit wild and eccentric/unconventional. However, I do understand that there are people here who function better when they are working with a structure

EDIT: I think it might be best to move it back over to one of the other Guild City threads - maybe the original poll thread?

[DarkInfinity]

LOL! You and I are opposite in that sense. I come here to get away from structures. I find they limit my spontaneity and creativity, but then I've always been a bit wild and eccentric/unconventional. However, I do understand that there are people here who function better when they are working with a structure

I have two young children, I have plenty of unstructured wildness. Although to be fair, if I don't reign in my creativity/spontaneity I would never get anything done, I would be a perpetual thinker and never a doer.

[Redrobes]

I did see mention in one of the other threads about the work that goes into the zoomable maps (I'm a software engineer, programmer, code monkey whatever you want to call it) So learning about the process involved there does sound fun to me. If you ever do a tutorial, please let me know (or is there one in the tutorial section already?). I'm sure I could figure it out or find a tutorial somewhere else, but there is a difference learning from some random site and learning from a person you know does something and does it well.

The leaflet site has a load of tutorials on it so I just took some samples and played about. The hardest part is to make the tile set for it which is outside of the scope of the tutorials. But if your a code monkey then get some perl / python etc and run up some scripts to output a script and get image magick to create the tiles. It would take a while but its possible. You only need a 1K image chopped into 4x4 + 2x2 + 1 of 256x256 pixel tiles to make a sample set to start playing with. We use a 16K image with 6 levels of tiles but its all the same. Theres a couple of weird things about using your own tiles with an ortho view instead of something like mercator but with a bit of faffing you will get it working. Putting your own markers down is dead easy. Putting them down with links to other items is a little more tricky but not too bad. I have not played with all the other stuff like vector shapes, image overlays and so on. If you go to the main guild city thread where we discussed it all I have a link to a zoomable map I made for some nature site. From that one you should be able to view source and see the java script I used for it. On here its hidden by the php. Have a concerted go at the leaflet tuts and then start a thread about it and show up how you got on or post some questions and ill see how I can help.

Edit: Oh look - GDAL has a leaflet tile maker -> http://www.gdal.org/gdal2tiles.html