darrenkitlor's Abeir-Toril Map - Forgotten Realms

[Steel General]

I believe they've all been named, one of them is Anchorome (or something like that - not sure which one it is), though 4th edition really screws things up.

[darren_kitlor]

Big Changes/Fixes:
I'm creating both a 3rd Ed. and 4th Ed. map. Fortunately, I'm using Photoshop's PSB format (as I broke the 2 GB filesize early on). This allows me to create a separate layer group when I need to start working on 4th edition's carnage (4th edition really just said "f' it" to the Realms by putting a good portion of my map underwater).

Continents:

• Anchorome (North of Maztica, connected as far as Realms lore says)
• Faerûn (what most of us are familiar with)
• Kara-Tur (east of Faerun; analogous to Asia)
• Katashaka (landmass south of Maztica)
• Osse (huge continent SE of both Kara-Tur and Zakhara)
• Zakhara (SE of Faerûn; Al-Qadim / "Arabian Nights" setting)

Big Fix:
The planet Abeir-Toril was cleaved in two by Ao. Toril is the world we're familiar with via Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, and all the 2nd/3rd edition Settings. Abeir is seen more in Spelljammer.

[darren_kitlor]

Updated:

• Add true sea coloring (hand-brushed using three layers to convey depth subtly)
• Improved land coloring/texturing (heavily hand-brushed - each geographic type is a separate layer)
• Fixed misspelling of Faerûn

To-Do:

• Improve Coastlines and Sea of Swords Islands (they have irregular coast upon close inspection)
• Improve coloring and texturing (deserts need the most love)
• Add snow and grasslands coloring/texture layers

Sneak Peek:

16.(6)% Zoom (very detailed but you can see the flaws in the islands quite clearly - it's a tedious but easy fix though):

16%zoomTOril.jpg

[darren_kitlor]

Snowfall / Cloud Test Image

It's really quite challenging but this will greatly enhance the realistic feel of the map (I can disable the clouds and snowfall via layers for a more readable/political map experience).

I'd really like some feedback - is this a critical hit or fail?

TorilMapCloudTest.jpg

[Ascension]

I don't think clouds are needed unless you wrap it around a globe and with the title at the bottom it's more of a wall poster. The clouds look ok but I'm not a good judge of clouds.

[Steel General]

I'm with Ascension on the need for clouds - though I don't think they look to bad so far.

[darren_kitlor]

Thanks!

Since I'm very layer-grouping oriented, they'll be four version of my map:
+3rd and +4th edition variants
+with or +without atmospheric effects (i.e. lava near Neverwinter, snow falling over the spine of the world, etc.)

[darren_kitlor]

Here's an update -showing coloring of the Zakhara coastline- (3 coloring layers; 2 depth layers for land - 3 layers for water effects) 50% zoomed-out:

[Ascension]

That looks really nice, man. The mountains in the brown areas might need some beefing up (I can't tell if there are mountains there or not but the relief is mostly lost there).

[Big Mac]

Abeir is seen more in Spelljammer.

I'm a big fan of Spelljammer and have no recollection of seeing Abeir in any SJ source. As far as I know, the only information about it comes from the 4e FRCG. I think there is someone, somewhere, making a world out of the bits of Toril that got "lost" and filling in the details with Abeir-like stuff. But I can't recall exactly where they were.

Snowfall / Cloud Test Image
It's really quite challenging but this will greatly enhance the realistic feel of the map (I can disable the clouds and snowfall via layers for a more readable/political map experience).

I'd really like some feedback - is this a critical hit or fail?

I'm with Ascension and Steel General over the cloud layer. If you wrapped this into a sphere (sans your top and bottom boarders) and gave it to Silverblade's Suitcase for inclusing in a 3D space picture, the cloud layer would be great. But as it is, it just gets in the way of surface details.

That aside, I think this is one of the most attractive maps of Toril I've ever seen. But you might want to check your sources on Osse, as I've seen other maps that have gigantic lines (like the Nasca Lines). I believe the lines are supposed to be big enough to be visible from space.

So far I've not found anyone who knows why the lines are there, but they generate interest in the Spelljammer community.