Please. Your thoughts on joining Monthly Challenges.

[meleeguy]

I love the challenges, they are a great excitement generator and motivator. But I realize (as a moderately skilled hobbyist) I don't have the chops to finish one in 25 days that is even vaguely competitive. We've got some really first rate, professional mappers in the guild (which is a major attraction), but I see no point in going head to head (speaking only for myself). Past a certain point, psychologically being last all the time would vastly overshadow the benefits of practice. Or so my 46 or so years of life tell me. My time is better spent in the other forums where time isn't 'against' me. Now, I sure I'll enter some contests again soon. They are fun! But I need/want to finish my other maps. The Ambush Inn needs to be rptools enabled, and Fenridge Castle needs a massive gatehouse or two. And a road.


My thought is having different tiers or competitions for the various levels of mappers. Maybe run two competitions at once, one for previous winners and one for the 'herd'.


Map on my Cartographic 'brothers',
-meleeguy

[ravells]

My thought is having different tiers or competitions for the various levels of mappers. Maybe run two competitions at once, one for previous winners and one for the 'herd'.


Map on my Cartographic 'brothers',
-meleeguy

Funny you should mention that...

I just use the mapping challenges to experiment with different styles. If I don't have enough time in a month I try to find a style where I can complete the map quickly (like this month's entry as I was starting a new job and about to go on holiday).

I find that it's the encouragement that I get when I post my first effort that gives me the confidence to go on. I think that most of my maps are terrible compared to others - the trick is just not to let it worry you and to do the best within your limits. Of course it's nice to win occasionally, but it's just fun being part of a community where you help each other get better.

Have a bash - that's what I say, and use the challenges to improve your own skills. All that can happen is that you'll get a little bettter.

[Ascension]

Here's how I see it...in college I was in a fraternity, we had some 150+ dudes but only 20 or so of us really ever did anything..making floats, playing intramural sports, running for office, etc. So no matter how many members the guild has only a fraction will actually do anything. This is really not a problem though...everyone joins hoping to get something out of it...even if it is just the ability to view the pics we all post up. Those who are the most passionate about what they do will be the active ones irregardless of "what others think".

The second thing is that I think some of the past challenges have focused on what I call the "close up" stuff like dungeons and encounter-style maps. Certain programs like CC3 and Dunjinni are the best tools to use for these types of maps with some post work in Photoshop or GIMP. I don't own either of those tools/programs so in order for me to do a pretty dungeon it requires me to invest a disproportionate amount of time creating something. If I had either of those I could whip out a decent dungeon in a day or two but since I don't it takes me some 5 hours just to create a decent chair. So challenges like those require me to have the right software so I'll just skip those no matter what. Sure I could draw something up by hand and that would be enough to suffice for a quickie game thrown together but would never come close to being something worthy of being called artistic.

I joined in June so I don't remember what that challenge was but July's challenge was that inn...I'm gonna skip that, August was a VTT dungeon and I did that one just to attempt to wrap my brain around that medium. I probably should have skipped that one as well since trying to do it all in Photoshop was very time consuming and irritating since I don't know anything about that stuff. This month's challenge was very generic despite being given an initial rough sketch. I just like to draw (or in this case, use a mouse to draw) and close up stuff is harder to do than the city or regional stuff that I like.

I think, and this is just my own hunch, that if the challenges were more generic and "large-scale" like cities and regions and what not that there would be more entries. The thing that I think is most important is the scale...all of us are good at drawing maps but we're not all good at designing a pub with all the doohickys that go inside...heck it took me 5 hours once just to do up a nice table whereas I can do a whole continent in 2 hours. So for me, I'll join in on the bigger stuff and forgo software specific stuff like dungeons.

[Sirith]

The second thing is that I think some of the past challenges have focused on what I call the "close up" stuff like dungeons and encounter-style maps. Certain programs like CC3 and Dunjinni are the best tools to use for these types of maps with some post work in Photoshop or GIMP. I don't own either of those tools/programs so in order for me to do a pretty dungeon it requires me to invest a disproportionate amount of time creating something.

...

I think, and this is just my own hunch, that if the challenges were more generic and "large-scale" like cities and regions and what not that there would be more entries. The thing that I think is most important is the scale...all of us are good at drawing maps but we're not all good at designing a pub with all the doohickys that go inside...heck it took me 5 hours once just to do up a nice table whereas I can do a whole continent in 2 hours. So for me, I'll join in on the bigger stuff and forgo software specific stuff like dungeons.

I think you have a point here, one that applies to me as well. I draw and paint maps, so dungeons take me more time to do than overland maps, because the latter is WAY easier to simply draw or paint.
Though for me it's also that I just love overland, regional and continental mapping waaaay more than drawing dungeons and buildings

So yeah, I should've joined this month, but let's just say I had other stuff on my mind, that distracted me from this . That said, I haven't joined ANY challenge since I first signed up, mostly because of those distracting things, so I may not be the best person to comment on challenges