March 2018 Challenge: The Bitter Winter (or, Calanthavian Election of 1579 VCE)

[AzureWings]

After mulling around the idea of the 'map a feud' prompt, and having an odd desire to create a map with circular pie-chart-like indicators surrounding some sort of regional markers (you'll hopefully be seeing what I mean soon, though not quite as of yet), the idea came to me of an election map. So I've begun working on an election map showing a situation of early-modern-era politics in a fantasy world.

The titular feud in question is a bit fuzzy and difficult to concretely narrow down to one thing, but ultimately the closest estimate is essentially an aristocratic vs. republican conflict. The nation of Calanthavia, not too long ago - more than a generation but definitely less (probably a lot less) than a century - had a civil war, in which the monarchy was overthrown. However, this was not the end of the traditional aristocracy, as to accomplish this feat the pro-republic faction had to garner support from some existing nobility, who to varying degrees were either sympathetic or just hoping to gain something out of overthrowing the current rulers. These nobility that were not ousted in the first civil war, while not given explicit hereditary political power, were allowed to retain much of their substantial lands and wealth, and quickly formed a powerful political bloc in the new parliamentary system. However, this was neither enough for the nobles nor the pro-republicans: the nobles were, generally speaking, displeased at the loss of their formal hereditary power and at commoners being brought to a de jure if not de facto level political playing field with them; the revolutionaries were, generally speaking, displeased to varying extents that the nobles still could wield power at all. And this resentment simmered, but didn't boil over for a fair bit of time: the Estates Party, the noble's main group, and the Conservative Party, a more commoner-friendly front group for the traditional aristocracy, were at the least always an important part of the coalition government Calanthavia had in each election term after the revolution, but the revolutionary faction - of which the most individually powerful group was the Trade & Goods Party, also had enough of a political presence to require consideration.

This ended after the election of 1579 VCE, known afterwards as the 'Bitter Winter'. Some up-and-coming, volatile speakers in the Conservative Party spurred a breakaway from the Estates Party, reinventing the party's identity as preserving traditional Calanthavian values without the power of the hereditary aristocracy. The resulting slight thaw between the Conservatives and Trade & Goods led to a new coalition that did not include the Estates, the bastion of the remaining aristocracy. And they did not take it well - shortly after the Bitter Winter, when the anti-aristocratic factions seemed more and more to display real intent to strip remaining political power from the aristocracy, there was an attempted coup, known as the 'Gold Coup' after a common nickname for the Estates Party (Gold Party), that then was dragged out into the Second Calanthavian Civil War, a bloody conflict between two unholy alliances of factions, many of the members of which hated each other almost-but-not-quite-as-much as their opposition (the aristocracy secured the support of seafolk separatists, who they normally looked heavily down upon, with a promise of independence post-conflict; the anti-aristocratic faction included the early industrialist bourgeoisie along with proto-communists united only by their shared dislike of the aristocracy). However much the Bitter Winter was only symptomatic of existing tensions as the political landscape of Calanthavia shifted, by and large it was considered the breaking point of the division between the old, aristocratic faction and the newer, republican faction.

Here's the map thus far - mostly just showing political borders. The presence of the seafolk - merpeople, basically - in this fantasy setting means that the water regions of Calanthavia also have administrative divisions, although the seafolk are at this point in history subject to discrimination and are in some ways de facto disenfranchised. All of the aquatic administrative regions as a whole have more regional seats in the National Assembly than any single land province... by exactly one seat, out of 338 regional seats. I went with a somewhat mixed-member proportional-like parliamentary system, because it seemed like it would make for a more visually-interesting map than a first-past-the-post electoral system, so Calanthavia has 338 regional seats elected by citizens of each administrative region voting for candidates and 169 proportional seats that are allocated so as to bring the total distribution of Assembly seats to parties as close to proportional to the party vote as possible.

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[Greg]

Sounds like you've got a pretty decent plan for this one, AW. Such great and detailed lore there too. Looking forwards to seeing what you do with the pie-chart-y indicators!

[Wingshaw]

A very promising start to this, AW. I'm a bit of a sucker for complex political stories, so I'm liking the direction this is heading already.

Wingshaw

[Diamond]

Um... and when are you planning to write this novel? Soon, I hope?

[AzureWings]

Sounds like you've got a pretty decent plan for this one, AW. Such great and detailed lore there too. Looking forwards to seeing what you do with the pie-chart-y indicators!

Thanks! You'll get to see those now, actually!

A very promising start to this, AW. I'm a bit of a sucker for complex political stories, so I'm liking the direction this is heading already.

Thanks!

Um... and when are you planning to write this novel? Soon, I hope?

Hahaha - I'm flattered, I think. I do try to dabble in writing prose from time to time, but always find myself too distracted by more worldbuilding to get through building a good character-driven narrative or writing dialogue or that sort of thing. Maybe this is another opportunity - there are some relatively pivotal characters I've already got in mind for the political milieu of Calanthavia surrounding the Bitter Winter (and for all its issues for considering real history, the Great Person model of history can be convenient for fictional worldbuilding - though I like to think I tend to put some thought into more societal-scale economic and demographic factors as well).


Anyways, here's the Calanthavian Election of 1579 with the regional seat distribution displayed for the National Assembly. The name fonts and locations (though not the names) and capital city location are temporary and just there now to add some extra context. I'll have an on-map key for reading the labels and province colors later, but the numbers in each province or aquatic zone state the number of regional seats allocated to that province, while the piechart around the edge of the circle lays out proportionally how many of those seats were won for candidates from each political party. You may notice that in some cases the province color differs from the largest slice of the piechart; that's because the province colors note which party won a plurality (fainter color) or majority (stronger color) of the party vote for that province (as opposed to the regional seats), which affects on the national level the number of proportional seats allocated to each party.

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The number of regional seats given to each province is based on its population, according to the last National Census*, so it can be seen that the population of Calanthavia is definitely not uniformly distributed! The ongoing process of urbanization has led to a centralization towards the more-industrialized cities concentrated in the west, leaving the more agrarian regions in the east, especially southeast, (not coincidentally also the regions largely still under traditional aristocratic holdings) a bit sparser in population.

*You may recall mention of de facto disenfranchisement of the seafolk. Part of this is that, as current technology does not really support cheap, disposable writing for underwater use, seafolk need to come to shore to be counted in the Census (or vote, for that matter). Although seafolk are capable of breathing out of water, they don't have legs, and while they just need to come to shore for registration it can be enough of an out-of-the-way effort that it inhibits their participation in the electoral process. Further measures could be taken address this as things currently stand, but prejudice/ethnocentrism in Calanthavia exists sufficiently that the issue is not seen as a major priority by many factions. This substantially contributes to the low apportionment of Assembly seats to aquatic zones; if the Census were as generally accurate on sea as on land Ilanta (as an example) would have at least twice its current number.

For further context, the seven major political parties (some of which are still relatively 'fringe') active at this time in Calanthavia:

Trade & Goods Party (Pro-Republic; Capitalist/Pro-Free-Trade): The most prominent and powerful of the pro-republic/anti-aristocracy parties. Probably not coincidentally, it is also where most of the post-monarchial 'new money' is, and many of its leading voices are those of Calanthavia's fledgling captains of industry. While not necessarily radically opposed to all of the traditional institutions of Calanthavia, Trade & Goods is generally happy to discard many of them where they should inhibit laissez-faire economic policy. Until the prelude to this election they were fairly staunch opposition to both the Conservative Party and the Estates Party, finding some common cause with the Union Party; in the Bitter Winter's immediate aftermath Trade & Goods formed a coalition government with the Conservatives, a large part of what eventually prodded the old aristocracy into the Gold Coup. The Trade & Goods Party has also historically been in opposition with the Free Worker's Party (natch) as well as the Maritime and Ilåveth Liberation Parties; the use/abuse in industry, especially shipping, of seafolk as cheap marine labor has been a sticking point with the latter two groups. Trade & Goods is strongest in the northwest, a region integrated into Calanthavia not long before the overthrow of the monarchy; said region has had less historical attachment to old and preexisting Calanthavian institutions and so has been less attracted to the typical rhetoric of the Estates and Conservatives. The current party head is Syrene Almolat, a shrewd and calculating businesswoman.

Conservative Party (Recently pro-Republic; Conservative): Historically a more commoner-facing front group for the Estates Party and the traditional aristocracy, heavily featuring rhetoric tying the preservation of old values and institutions of Calanthavia to said hereditary nobility, the Conservative Party reinvented itself in the time to the Bitter Winter, driven by some more volatile new blood. By the time of the election this included new party leader Cyric Sagarin, a fiery younger speaker and common-born scholar promoting a reintegration of traditional institutions - marrying these to new ideas and developments, rather than throwing them out wholesale, but - key to the political platform he promoted in the party - those new developments including a strict separation from the hereditary aristocracy and promoting measures to curtail application by said aristocracy of 'soft' power to circumvent those limitations. This marked a shift in the overall party policy forming a sharp divide from the Estates Party, one of the most significant changes leading to the Bitter Winter and what laid beyond the fateful election. Popular Calanthavian history in later generations often laid the cause of the Second Civil War at Sagarin's feet, though more rigorous scholarship tended to find Sagarin's leadership of the Conservatives was likely more a symptomatic turning point of preexisting currents than the source of the shift in and of itself. As of the Bitter Winter, the Conservatives proved to gain significant support, particularly in those of the populated, more urban regions where the aristocracy had remained well established until now. In many of the eastern agrarian regions as well, while much of the populace still tended to elect regional representatives from the Estates Party, the Conservatives had a surge in popularity in the party vote. People who had some attraction to the republican spirit but still saw the particular nobility they and their ancestors had been familiar with as the natural choice in leaders (hence their continued popularity in regional candidacy) had options for a difference ideological tack that still offered the preservation of a more familiar Calanthavia, which divorced from particular candidates in the context of the party vote proved more popular.

Estates Party (Traditional/Reactionary; Aristocratic): The banner under which the (substantial) remaining aristocracy of Calanthavia gathered after the First Civil War (known as simply 'the Revolution' in this time period), largely aimed at preservation of their own power bases (but also, in somewhat better faith, at preservation of existing and familiar Calanthavian institutions and traditions and advocating caution against making possibly catastrophic societal changes). For a period they weathered the removal of their formal hereditary political power quite well, with significant resources and residual influence among the common person of Calathavia, but urbanization and drift towards the developing industrial centers in the west (where comparatively more of the nobility had been ousted in the Revolution) was slowly eroding this power base. Often nicknamed the 'Gold Party' due to its worthies owning the lion's share of interest in Calanthavia's mines and bullion (or, more darkly, in reference to buying political influence - not that other parties doing this to varying extents was at all unlikely in this period). Strongest in the more agrarian eastern regions where the by-far largest landowners and employers were the nobility. In the election of 1579, the party leader was Ludic Thiramovis, a Tarvilan count who was an excellent administrator but only middling speaker.

Union Party (Militaristic; Revolutionary; Nationalist): Many of the more radical of the anti-monarchist revolutionaries, post-First Civil War - the ones, it might be said, that were willing to put ideology before even reasonably practical concerns - formed their own bloc in the postwar republic. The most fiery among them even advocated a course of pursuing the overthrow of neighboring monarchies, and the eradication of the remnants of Calanthavia's, including mass seizure of land and wealth. As time went on the party's overall identity coalesced into a strongly anti-monarchist, almost jingoistically pro-Calanthavia platform promoting the formation of new institutions of governance and infrastructure out of whole cloth, for the 'loyal and true common man of Calanthavia' as opposed to the old, depicted solely as means of aristocratic control. Their eager support of urbanization has been a periodic source of common ground with Trade & Goods, though the coalition government following the Bitter Winter drove something of a wedge between them as Union was rather opposed even to the new Conservatives. The Union Party was smaller than the 'big three' above at the time of the Bitter Winter, but had two major poles of support - the west-central urban and urbanizing regions surrounding Milban, and the northeastern border, where moderate coastal urban development brought new ways and border tensions with neighboring Volgarlind promoted nationalism. The Union Party, though at this time of one face, was already beginning to differ a bit between the western and northeastern regions where it had a presence; the western became progressively more and more fanatical about their model of a new Calanthavia and the reinvention of its infrastructure, government and even culture, while the northeastern (partly due to the ongoing border tensions) developed a more strongly ethnocentric and humanocentric bent (though both had at least some of the latter; the Union Party could never get along with Maritime or Ilåveth). Neither would really take center stage in Calanthavian politics until some time after the Second Civil War. In the election of 1579, the party head was Darios Myrland, an intimidating man who had played a major role as a military commander in the Revolution.

Free Worker's Party (Proto-Communist; Revolutionary): A fledgling offshoot of a stronger movement imported from neighboring (and more industrialized) Allatia, the Free Worker's Party advocated the equal and free redistribution of power and wealth, frequently deriding the industrial bourgeoisie as the 'new aristocracy'. At this time period it remained mostly a fringe movement, though it was able to secure seven regional Assembly seats and fifteen total seats in the Bitter Winter; it only really had a presence in regions experiencing stronger degrees of industrialization. It also had notable support from some seafolk, though it did not take any aquatic regional seats in this election; issues of worker's treatment and rights echoed strongly with some commercial practices regarding employment of the seafolk as cheap unskilled maritime labor. This was the first election in which the Free Worker's Party was really organized enough that members of the 'big three' could even reliably name its party leader, Cygnir Balenkir, a former Landow factory worker and amateur writer who was somewhat poorly educated but remarkably charismatic.

Maritime Party (Land/Sea Integration; Pro-Seafolk): A party formed around a platform of pursuing substantial integration of seafolk and land-based society, and championing the rights of seafolk and the need for Calanthavia as a whole to take more steps to accommodate the challenges of interaction between land and sea. Although relatively moderate on the broader republic/aristocratic conflict that defined the Bitter Winter most strongly, it was still of significant importance, and notably, more willing to find common cause with the Estates than with Trade & Goods in light of industrial exploitation of seafolk labor (despite not being very fond of the traditional land aristocracy either). While the majority of its adherents are seafolk - as one of two pro-seafolk parties and the one more likely to apply to seafolk readily able to vote in elections, it enjoys a dominant position in the seafolk voting demographic - there are land-dwelling members of the Maritime Party, particularly in coastal areas, though they are often a minority among their peers. The current party head is Sîlmalví Iklåferma, an Ilanta-native seafolk woman known for presenting a remarkably amiable front to both allies and enemies.

Ilåveth Liberation Party (Seafolk Separatist, Pro-Seafolk): A more radical stance on seafolk issues, this party supports independence for the seafolk under the name of the ancient seafolk nation of Ilåveth (the more accurate seafolk name of the region vesthiricized to 'Ilanta' in Calanthavian official nomenclature). Essentially only supported by seafolk, its popular base is much larger than the election results in this and earlier elections make it seem, as seafolk supporting the ILP make up an especially large proportion of those less likely to be counted in the Census or able/available to vote in Calanthavian elections (particularly open-ocean/deep-water-dwelling seafolk, such as much of the population of Orantalis). Their more vocal and present speakers nonetheless receive enough support to occupy a few regional seats in this and previous elections. Among these is the current party head, Kedråneid Kîlkorae, though her poor ability to disguise her contempt for most land-dwellers does her party a disservice in the broader political arenas, as much as it attracts some demographics of seafolk supporters.

[Diamond]

Holy sh!t, you DO love world-building! Looking forward to reading that when I get home tonight.

[AzureWings]

Legend now included! I'm actually sort of running out of things to add - all that seems to be left is a compass and scale bar, as well as the national and provincial capitals. I also did tweak some of the voting numbers just a liiiiitle bit from my previous plans (you'll notice the Free Workers party has 16 Assembly seats rather than 15 as I said previously) to match for internal consistency. The font for the province names also grew on me fair bit, as you can see - so I just tweaked the placement of some of the more awkward ones instead of changing them all up.

Also, any advice on antialiasing? My coastline in particular seems to be in a sweet spot where GIMP's antialiasing filter doesn't seem to accomplish anything at all on it, and trying to make something manually with blurring effects tends towards being 'blurry' rather than 'smooth', even if I try to be very light-handed with it. Is there likely to be a decent solution other than redrawing it by hand (if there were a time to regret switching from the hand-drawn line to a stroke along the same edge for consistency...)?

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Finally, lore: An overview of the regions of Calanthavia:

Northwestern (Mulengerry, Brellony, Lettenvals, Landow): A region that was newly integrated into Calanthavia shortly prior to the overthrow of the monarchy, the northwestern region sharing a border with Allatia has fewer ties to the longer-established old-guard factions of Calanthavian government. Combined with the fact that the region is further along in urbanization and industrialization than most of the rest of the country, it is little surprise that the Trade & Goods Party enjoys its strongest support in this region. In what is possibly more of a surprise, its (relative) lack of ties to preexisting Calanthavian institutions and popular interest in republican government, along with some of the tension and demographic disagreements coming from being a region close to a border with a nation it was once a part of has almost paradoxically made it also a bit receptive to the Union Party’s particular brand of nationalism - some people in the region seem more willing to wave a patriotic banner behind a new, completely reinvented Calanthavia that might include them by design, rather than as additions to an existing structure. With burgeoning industry and a number of large and well-established port cities, the northwestern region is a very important one for Calanthavia. Both the industry and democratic spirit are a bit less pronounced in Lettenvals as compared to the other three provinces in this region - the more inland parts of the rugged foothills here have made it more of a mining-centric region, where former Allatian noble families still hold a lot of influence in the wake of concessions originally granted to them by the pre-Revolution crown during the integration of the region. That said, Lettenvals is still rather urban and progressive-leaning compared to many provinces in other parts of Calanthavia.

Southwestern (Arstrow, Ediznow, Tarvila, Melthors, Milban): The central core of Calanthavia, the southwestern region contains the capital of Elenzmar, located in the province of Ediznow (coincidentally also the single most populous province in the country). The region as a whole is the most populated, having a long history of being a population nexus as a fertile region with more warmth than the northern coast yet still flush with water from Lake Gendoris and the rivers that run through here where the mountain foothills merge into the lowlands. In more modern times it has had the benefits towards the centralization of cities granted by being nearer the nation’s halls of power. Though industrialization and the revolutionary spirit from the First Civil War have injected quite a bit of pro-republic support in the region (to say nothing of a large proportion of the nobles ousted in the Revolution being from this area as well), as the traditional capital the historical nobility and established institutions still have a lot of influence here. In the wake of the party’s split from the Estates Party the Conservatives gained significantly in this region as a result of being a middle ground between the ‘revolutionary spirit’ and the historical establishment. Milban is something of an interesting note here - lying between the northwestern and southwestern regions it has often been the place where much of the conservative and aristocratic interest in industrialization has been concentrated, making it something of an unusual melting pot of political views even before taking into account it being where Darios Myrland gathered much of the Union Party’s initial support (fitting given his military history as Milban, being one of the places where the ‘old money’ gets most involved in industry, is the center of Calanthavia’s military industry and arms manufacturing).

Coastal (Sprithgyr, Brecovia, Elstard, Taldan): The other part of Calanthavia to have seen the largest moves towards industrialization and consequently urbanization as a result of their historical involvement in maritime shipping and trade. The relative success of Trade & Goods in this region is reflective of this, although the further east you go the more influence the aristocratic families retain. The continuing urbanization has led to increases in the local populations in many of the coastal areas throughout the last few decades. As a fair chunk of this population has been drawn from regions south of the coast this has led to some resentment in those regions resulting from envy of the more-quickly-improving fortunes in the coastal regions. However, further east, at least, any of this is generally overshadowed by the specter of tensions with Volgarlind, most especially in Taldan on the actual border (and along a particular stretch that has been the site of numerous historical disputes with the neighboring country).

Central (Lextanyr, Barratess, Sparadrow, Velmora): More agrarian and traditionalist than most of the rest of the regions covered so far, the ‘Central’ region can largely be considered transitional: seeing the benefits of Calanthavia’s industrialization more slowly than areas further west or nearer the coast, but more quickly than areas further east and further inland; the historical aristocracy still more powerful and wealthy in aggregate than further west but not so much so as further east; and so on. Much like the east of Calanthavia, their less-industrialized and inland position makes issues more specific to urbanization and industrialization or to the seafolk or maritime trade less relevant locally and largely ignored entirely in regional politics. The border with Lakenstria is a calm one, that country being a historical ally and trading partner to Calanthavia, so international issues are also of less immediate relevance to the region; compared to the national scale politics in the central region can seem almost simplified. However, it is also a place where ‘on the ground’ one feels the push and pull to and away from the traditional aristocracy most strongly, as the strength of new and old ways of thinking here see more of a parity among the general populace. Around the time of the Bitter Winter there was a substantial amount of politically-motivated unrest and even rioting in the central region, with traditionalist and revolutionary groups making frequent posturing moves against their local opposition.

Eastern (Entora, Tristard, Belvia, Maltenvia, Herratas, Lusinow, Galtaran, Torimont, Myrania): A geographically large, but more agrarian, less urbanized, and increasingly-sparesly-polulated (by comparison) region of Calanthavia, the eastern region remains the bulwark of the old aristocratic families. Even where the majority of the locals supported the overthrow of the monarchy in the Revolution, many remain more comfortable with familiar regional dynasties retaining de facto local control, especially as the face of more westerly Calanthavia rapidly becomes more and more unfamiliar to many of the eastern regions’ inhabitants. Galtaran and Belvia are the population centers of the region, largely by dint of history rather than present patterns; the original regions for the prominence of those regions are becoming less and less relevant but that history and the population present have given them something of an inertia of their own, and the two provinces are generally considered the most important parts of the eastern region of Calanthavia. Among other reasons, Galtaran contains the easiest route through the Sethtalginds to Lakenstria along the Galten Pass, while Belvia is the effective headquarters of Calanthavia’s eastern military presence (important due to the rocky history and presently still somewhat tense relations with Volgarlind across the eastern border, which Belvia has much of). Much of what industrialization has reached the eastern region is heavily concentrated in those two provinces, while in contrast regions such as Torimont and Myrania are almost technologically backward, what relevance they do have stemming almost entirely from mining and agriculture.

The Isles (Aringstavis, Shoravis): Home to an originally culturally quite distinct group, but integrated into Calanthavia long ago, the two provinces known colloquially as ‘the Isles’ still have somewhat unique patterns in their local politics. With relatively low populations (partly due to lack of land area and partly due to being comparatively rural) but close proximity to regions undergoing the most rapid change, the state of the Isles in the Bitter Winter is no exception to this. As the region is neither particularly progressive nor tied to old mainland factions, the changes in the Conservative party garnered it a lot of support in the Isles in the election of 1579; in Shoravis the Conservatives won an outright majority of the party vote, something they managed in no other provinces in the Bitter Winter. The Isles also see a proportionally large amount of support (for land provinces) for the Maritime Party; this is partly due to more interaction and higher visibility for seafolk giving rise to more sympathetic views from local land-dwellers and partly due to seafolk residents of the provinces themselves (seafolk residents of land provinces being possible due to a somewhat complex and specific legal definition involving land reachability of domiciles and seafolk residing in intertidal zones), which are a more significant demographic group here than in any other land provinces.

Aquatic Zones (Gendoris, Ilanta, Imgefroth, Selbask, Melsk, Orantalis, Solvosk): The aquatic administrative zones are the apportionments of Calanthavia’s significant national waters, analogous to land provinces and populated almost solely by seafolk (that is to say, entirely, barring a handful of really bizarre exceptions). Obviously, issues of seafolk integration (or Ilåveth separatism) are the dominant political issues on a national scale (though there is a a more general mixture of political issues on local scales). In times long past the seafolk of the Calanthavian coast were an independent polity in the form of the undersea state of Ilåveta; they were integrated into Calanthavia years ago in a mostly peaceable manner in the aftermath of an Ilåveth succession crisis (‘mostly’ because while the dominant seafolk political faction at the time was supportive of the integration there were several less-central groups in significant opposition to the move). Lake Gendoris became notable in terms of seafolk population and political relevance only in the many years following this integration; while not a strictly saltwater species it is preferable to residing in freshwater and the latter can lead to some (as yet, known but somewhat poorly-studied) health issues for seafolk in the long term. This biological limitation has not proven quite severe enough to curtail the draw of close proximity to the capital of Calanthavia as a whole, though it is still a factor. The most populous aquatic administrative zone remains Ilanta, the site of the capital and general center of state of old Ilåveta; where is next-most-populous is not as clear as it may seem. The National Census of Calanthavia has poor accuracy in the aquatic zones, due partially to the current lack of a solution (partly due to lack of trying, partly because any solution would be at least somewhat nontrivial) to the issue of easily-produced large-scale permanent record keeping for aquatic use to match the paper records used on land in distribution and scope. Requiring seafolk to come to shore to be counted ends up leaving a great many out, especially in regions with less bordering coast (particularly Orantalis, where there is literally a single site for census registration and voting). Most politically-notable figures among seafolk are female, harkening to the traditionally-matriarchal history of Ilåveta.

[elboe]

Very nice map. Nice style that seems to fit the purpose of the map well. Very interesting backstory as well.

[Meshon]

Really cool. I totally want to play a political board game on this, it looks really good, with some sweet infographics!

Sent from my SGH-I747M using Tapatalk

[AzureWings]

Teensy update to add a couple final details - compass rose and the national capital's location (ultimately I felt that adding the provincial capitals made the map too cluttered). Not much of a change but they were things I did want to add before calling the map really finished (also there were a few tiny fixes like making the 507 the same size as the 338; they were slightly off before).

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