Strange Fantasy Map Please

[The_Lady_Tear]

Before I say anything else, thanks for looking at this post and thank you to anyone willing to help.

Commission
I don't have much money to spend on a map right now, so unless the map is really, really good then this would be an unpaid job. If you would like to do it and think you can add something really special, but require a price, let me know and I will consider it.

Time Constraints
Because I am asking for something for free, I don't feel right setting a time limit, but faster is better. I am using the map for a RPG I am already playing, one that is suffering from my poor map drawing abilities.

Style
Whatever the drawer thinks would look best. I am not really very artistic, so I don't know what styles would fit the map best. Although, I would think a cartoony kind of style might fit best. One where you have the wilderness and cities and stuff kind of popping out at you. I am not sure how easy/hard that will be, but it could fit the map type well.

Description of Map
Hopefully this will grab you map makers out there. The map is of a world that is very archetypeical, almost to an absurd level. The land of each nation takes on the traits of the nation. For some examples, the nation Sandlash is a giant desert covered in strong windstorms. However, as soon as you leave Sandlash the wind stops and you are no longer in a giant desert. The nation of Sin has many large cities where you can find anything and everything that is a carnal desire. In Unearthed you will be moving on rope bridges connected to the floating bits of earth over an endless chasm.

So for this map I will need specific terrain types based on the nation you are in. These types will not have gradual changes, but instead they will be shear boundaries separating the different nations.

The nations:
Land of the Blue: The most prosperous land. It is in the center of the map, and in the center of it is a giant blue tower. There are 3 cities at the edge of the nation and the rest is peaceful plains.

Necrata: Land of the dead. Necrata is a very large nation that is covered with ancient battlefields. Graveyards litter the nation. The land itself is dead, leaving no room for wildlife or vegetation. Necrata should border Sin, Malevolot and Floeth.

Quarrith: Mountain lands. Steep, tall mountains shoot up across this land. On its borders the mountains seemed to have been cut leaving a sheer edge and a long drop.

Frozen Plains of Floeth: This land is covered in ice. The weather is always sleeting, snowing, or having a blizzard. This place is also pretty large. It has at least 1 mountain chain, also frozen over.

Sandlash: As described above, a windblow desert.

Fiery Fields of the Holocaust: Like Floeth was frozen, Holocaust is always burning. What set it on fire is unknown, but it continues to burn. Volcano and streams of molten lava flow threw this land.

The Spiteful Lands of Malevolot: This nation is pretty large, slightly smaller than Necrata. The land is covered in rocky trails and overgrown roads. The cities are large and few.

The Virtuous Lands of Angela: This place is very peaceful. There a quaint little forests, nice paths leading to and from its many cities. Each city is white and spotless, and there are many of them. The majority of the landscape is plains. There are lakes and rivers. This is about half the size of Necrata.

Acrama: Land of magic. This is about the size of Malevolot. There is one great city in the center. All over the nation are tall wizard towers. There are ruins of old cities. There are ancient forests. Everything here is very old.

Exaltaria: This is smaller than Angela. Here there are a few cities, each with a great cathedral shooting out of it. The lands are covered mostly in light forests.

Dracatic: This place is the land of dragons. It is covered in different areas that are specific to different types of dragons lairs (if you are familiar with D&D that is what I am using, if not I can describe to you). I didnt have this in my map, but now I think it would be great to have it shaped like a dragon.

Unearthed: As I described earlier, this land is a giant chasm with floating rocks above it. The larger of the rocks are connected by rope bridges. There are a few cities, one of which is nested on the largest of all the rocks, the others are built on many rocks.

Serpantia: Land of the snakes. This will have forests and deserts. It would be nice to have it so that it is shaped like a snake with alternating forest and desert (like the pattern of a snake).

Mystik: This is the land of ghosts. It is covered in dead forests and desert that has no life (similar to that of Necrata). Should border Necrata. There are small ghost towns around the area.

Delusia: Land of madness. There is one city here, it is very large and unorganized. The rest of the land seems to fit a madness also. The forests are dense and tangled. The mountains are tall. The rivers flow is circles.

Wildlands: This is a land of dense dark forest. There are a few cities inside its branches.

Everwar: This land is a giant battlefield. It is mostly plains with cities all inside it.

Kieto: A large island chain. I could use a better name for this one also, if anyone has any suggestions. Each island has different geography.

Isles of Discordia: On the opposite side of Kieto. This is another island chain, only these islands are all small and clustered together.

Sin: As described above, this is a land covered in cities and roads. There is very little wilderness left.

Rockland: This is a land of giants. It is mostly hilly, but does have some tall mountains and lakes. It has 3 cities.

I tired to leave it kind of vague so that the artist has as much free will as possible to make the map cool. If you think you might want to do it, but need more, please let me know. I also have my sad map that you can look at to get some ideas.

The things that are most important is to get Land of the Blue in the center, bordered by Malevolot, Necrata, Exaltaria, Angela, Acrama, in that order (so going in a circle Acrama should then be touching Malevolot).

Quality
Better is better, but you cant really do worse than me so I will take anything.

Copyright
I don't really care as long as I can use it for my game. You (the artist) keeps all rights to it.

Hopefully this will interest someone out there. I had a lot of fun creating the idea and I think it could be lots of fun to draw. Please and thank you to anyone who will consider it.

I dont think I am allowed to get PM or send PM yet, so if you have any questions either post here or E-mail me The_Highelf_Tear--AT--yahoo.com (remove the --AT-- and add @ in its place).

Thanks to all
Tear

[Gidde]

I must say, at first I was kind of put off by the concept, but then I started reading the country descriptions and now I'm intrigued.

Can you post your map? There are a lot of folks on this site who put me to shame, but I think this would be a fun project. If you don't get any other takers, I'd probably like to give it a shot.

[The_Lady_Tear]

Thanks for replying! Hopefully I added it right. Let me know if you cant make anything out. Again, I am a really, really bad artist. Also, if you look at the map and the descriptions, there are some differences. I am trying to leave it as open to the artist as I can. If you need anything for it though, please let me know and I can try to describe it as much as possible. No one else has offered, so if you would like to give it a shot, that would be wonderful.

[Ascension]

Give it a shot Gidde and if you get stuck, you know we are all here to help...just post your work along the way. If your style clashes with hers then maybe she can post some examples of what she likes.

[The_Lady_Tear]

I don't think that anyones style will clash with mine because mine has none. But I will be glad to show some things that I do like if you think it will help you.

Also, I wanted to say thanks again.

[Gidde]

Thanks for the encouragement

I'll get working on this one as soon as I finish rebuilding my computer this weekend. I have a few more questions for you in the meantime ...

What's the scale like? If you give me a baseline (i.e., X country is about 200 miles wide) I can take care of the rest.

Are the borders instantaneous (like you can stand with one foot in each of two countries) or is there a strip of no-man's land between them?

If you're planning on printing this, how big are you printing it? (So I can get the resolution right).

Since it's for a game, do you need a grid? If yes, do you prefer hex or square?


That should be enough to get me started; If I have more questions we can set up email or IM

[The_Lady_Tear]

Cool!

As far as scale, I can only give you estimates. I would say Land of the Blue is about 100 miles tall and 50 miles wide. Malevolot is probably 300 miles wide and 200-250 or so tall. This is just going off of how I was thinking about them in my notes and in my head, if you look at my map, they are not to that scale much at all. So again, I leave a lot of that in your arms. In the descriptions I gave some sizes compared to each other, and then with Malevolot, you should be able to get relative sizes. Also, on my map, you can tell which nations are larger and smaller, just the scale is screwed up.

I am not sure if it would be easier to draw it with more or less information. I am trying to make it as easy as I can by letting you have as much free will as possible. If you would prefer I give you more information, I would be glad to. If you would like, I can give you the approximate sizes of all the nations.

For borders, When I was thinking about it, I thought that they would be instantaneous. However, a strip of no mans land is kind of an interesting idea. I am not sure which would be more interesting, so I will leave that up to you, unless anyone else has a suggestion.

For printing, I havent thought about printing it out yet. I am not sure what is a normal size for these situations. I would like it at least to fit on one page, if that is not to difficult. Larger images would also be nice, so that I could see more detail. I also think I could get a printer to print out a larger version of the map if it was bigger than an average paper size.

So I guess, whatever you think is best. I would like enough detail so that I can use the map, but I don't want to put too much of a burden on you, and I am not sure if it gets harder with higher resolutions. I probably wouldn't want it much larger than the equivalent of 4 sheets of paper, unless you think that wouldn't have enough detail.

Sorry for being so indecisive. In my last game I had a player who liked and was good at drawing maps, so he always did them for me, and always by hand, so I have not done any printing of maps before.

I shouldn't need a grid. If you think it would look nicer with it, then I prefer square. If you don't think it adds to the map, then I would prefer it not be there.

Again, so sorry for being not very decisive. I will be glad to give you more information if you need it though. It might be easier, if you have questions, to ask over IM so that I can explain a little easier what I am thinking. I have windows live messenger, yahoo messenger and skype that I can use. If you would like to use any of those, then E-mail me The_Highelf_Tear--at--yahoo.com (replace the --at-- with @).

Thanks so much again, you are awesome!

[Steel General]

So can we mark this one as 'taken'?

[Gidde]

I'm not sure if that's a question for me or for TheLadyTear, but I'm certainly working on it.

[Steel General]

Well if you're working on it, I'll go ahead and mark it as taken. We can always change it later, should something come up.