Sorry I haven't been on here in a while...
I am working on a project to create a map for a fictional modern city. It's not for an RPG, but I figured you guys could help me out anyway.
I know what features it will have and the general topography, and I know enough to base it at lease loosely on real cities.
However, I don't know how to go about making a map. Any suggestions?
Quote from: Redforce;1025576Sorry I haven't been on here in a while...
I am working on a project to create a map for a fictional modern city. It's not for an RPG, but I figured you guys could help me out anyway.
I know what features it will have and the general topography, and I know enough to base it at lease loosely on real cities.
However, I don't know how to go about making a map. Any suggestions?
There's a fantastic G+ group called
The Library of Gaming Maps (https://plus.google.com/communities/101813627127281811598).
RPGnet also has a
thread (https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?822213-Digital-Mapping-Workshop-for-Gamers)on digital map design, might be of use.
Another way would be to get a map of a medieval / renaissance / Victorian-era central European city from Google or your local library etc, and just re-purpose that.
Thanks for the links, Motor.
Quote from: Redforce;1025583Thanks for the links, Motor.
Sorry, somehow I missed that you were looking specifically for modern. A city like Singapore might suit your needs, or maybe one of the new towns in England like Milton Keynes or Welwyn Garden City.
That's not a bad idea, and pretty close to what I am looking for, even though it's going to be an American city.
It's on one or two islands, like Gotham City (Batman), Liberty City (GTA IV), or Stilwater (Saints Row 2), in a bay right at the mouth of a large river.
Quote from: Redforce;1025587That's not a bad idea, and pretty close to what I am looking for, even though it's going to be an American city.
It's on one or two islands, like Gotham City (Batman), Liberty City (GTA IV), or Stilwater (Saints Row 2), in a bay right at the mouth of a large river.
Maybe somewhere in the Gulf States would fit, they've been building like mad from scratch these past few decades, and they are all on the coast.
Quote from: Motorskills;1025588Maybe somewhere in the Gulf States would fit, they've been building like mad from scratch these past few decades, and they are all on the coast.
Funny you should mention that- the real-world location for this city will be on the Gulf Coast.
Quote from: Redforce;1025590Funny you should mention that- the real-world location for this city will be on the Gulf Coast.
I meant Dubai, Qatar, Oman, etc. ;)
Quote from: Redforce;1025576Sorry I haven't been on here in a while...
I am working on a project to create a map for a fictional modern city. It's not for an RPG, but I figured you guys could help me out anyway.
I know what features it will have and the general topography, and I know enough to base it at lease loosely on real cities.
However, I don't know how to go about making a map. Any suggestions?
YouTube has plenty of videos for making such maps. Just pick a style to use from them.
Quote from: Shawn Driscoll;1025641YouTube has plenty of videos for making such maps. Just pick a style to use from them.
When I do a city map - I only do Early Modern+ games - I start off with what kind of access does this city have for Land (highway), Sea (Port), Air (Airport), and Internal (Streets & Mass Transit)? Rank that access 1-10. Does it have several major interstates coming into the city? It should rank high for Land. Is the airport small and cramped? It should rank low for Air. Is the subway system TEH SUCK? Internal is very low - etc. Then place these into neighborhoods. The interstate comes in from the west and skirts the city center before leaving to the south. The Airport is on the bay, hemmed in by tall buildings on three sides. The seaport is here in this commercial district along the bay.
Then I go neighborhood by neighborhood. What is this neighborhood? Residential? Commercial? Governmental? etc. So I choose, say, residential. Then what kind of residential - Dense (high rise rentals), Urban (low-rise rentals), Suburban (single family homes), etc. How nice is it? New? Old but spiffy? Dilapidated? Slummy? How big is it? How important is it to the city government? How do the cops see this neighborhood?
Then I ask: What are other neighborhoods are accessible easily from here? This helps interrelate everything. I usually draw a relationship map from this, like a schematic. Some games that's good enough. I would look at similar neighborhoods in similar cities. Houston TX, New Orleans LA, Galveston TX. See what they look like - maybe use photos of these neighborhoods to illustrate to the players. I might draw in important streets - high volume traffic or social importance. Spot interesting things - parks, playgrounds, theaters, shopping areas, restaurants, etc. You can always add these in as you play. I wouldn't bother drawing and naming side streets. You can always just describe them, but keep a list of names and make notes when you use these names. Otherwise you could end with three Charles Streets - which *could* happen, but is confusing. It's better to note "Charles Street - in Livingston Park, residential side street, bodega 'AJ's', donuts! Nicer than most streets in LP. Vietnamese restaurant 'What Dat Pho?' on corner Highland." That's what you need for roleplaying.
Added: Whups! Sorry! Misunderstood the "not for roleplaying" bit! I thought it was not for a published roleplaying game - just internal use. Then let's say this is all for developing the city, and actually drawing the map is techniques the other posts can help you with! :P
Cartographersguild.com also has an active membership. They specialize more in fantasy maps of cities and worlds, but in general cover everything. There is lots of advice to be found in the forums.
So, I'm a big fan of taking modern cities and playing with Google Maps, and a website called https://www.scribblemaps.com/ . There are lots of options, but I like using the "Pencil" option with the "Mapbox Custom" style.
Here's Istanbul in that style:
https://www.scribblemaps.com/create/#lat=41.02324110746467&lng=28.972771167755127&z=15&t=mb_pencil (https://www.scribblemaps.com/create/#lat=41.02324110746467&lng=28.972771167755127&z=15&t=mb_pencil)
To make a modern city, you have to think up the history of that city. To get a city that seems realistic today, unless that city is Brasilia, you need to first imagine how that city looked like in the past.
Quote from: RPGPundit;1026499To make a modern city, you have to think up the history of that city. To get a city that seems realistic today, unless that city is Brasilia, you need to first imagine how that city looked like in the past.
This is true. No city ever started at nearly the size it currently is. It began as something much smaller. You need to decide why people settled in the area in the first place. Fishing village? A good port area for shipping? A silver lode in the region? A good stop-over point for the railroad? Once you figure out why people settled there in the first place, you can figure out the city's "character" and start building up from there. You don't need to go through every year or decade of expansion, but it can help you determine where the building began, so you can work out how the city expanded over time and in what directions. It can also help you determine what kind of places and businesses the city got and when.
For example, a railroad stop would begin with the basic essentials of such a community: a tavern/saloon, a hotel, craftsmen and their houses,and a few businesses. These would expand to eventually include a town hall, major restaurants, theaters, and other "luxury" businesses as the town grows. As the decades go by, you would get highways and an airport. You might even lose a few things along the way. So, the layout would be a lot of the major buildings, like the town hall, the largest mercantile area, and major business districts close to the original building spot. Peripheral residences and businesses would expand out from that point. More advanced and larger things, like concentrated industrial parks, airports, and the such would usually be on the outer part of that, depending on when during the city's history they would have been built. Outside of these core city elements, it's often mainly suburban sprawl.
For real world examples, you should be able to find historic maps of old cities, like New York, Boston, London, and Paris, to compare their sizes and community nexuses over time.
Yes. Also, most cities that endure tend to change purposes repeatedly over time.
Does this logic apply to superhero fictional cities? Because, to me, those seem to evolve with the needs of the hero's stories and the convenience of the plot - maps are almost always an afterthought.
Logic never HAS to apply, but it helps, especially for a game based in a specific city. Even if you don't want to spend a lot of time working out the city's evolution, developing the city's character can help create it from scratch. Gotham, Metropolis, Central City, San Fransokyo all have their own character: the mood, the architectural style, the collective personality of the population. Based on these things, the city should have certain areas, buildings, and a style that compliments them which can be used for the campaign. Run down slums, warehouse districts, gambling zones, high-tech industrial areas. The map and layout can end up looking random, depending on how you make it, but there will usually be centers of activity for specific businesses. For example, you will generally not have a major university in the middle of the dock warehouse district, or a big casino in the midst of a middle-calls suburb. Even if you don't want to give a lot of thought to the history and layout over time, you should at least make sure that the placement of key locales and buildings make sense.
Campaign Cartographer is a tool you can use to create you're own maps. https://www.profantasy.com/
There are options for other map styles pre-built for you. They do these in back issues called annuals or month-by-month as a subscription in the current year.
Modern Political style -> https://www.profantasy.com/annual/2010/june10.html
Modern Road style -> https://www.profantasy.com/annual/2011/may11.html
Also, the aforementioned Cartogrpaher's Guild has a forum for those seeking to hire cartographers. You could inquire there with your specifications and get some bids. In the case you would rather not do it yourself. :-D
Quote from: Redforce;1025576Sorry I haven't been on here in a while...
I am working on a project to create a map for a fictional modern city. It's not for an RPG, but I figured you guys could help me out anyway.
I know what features it will have and the general topography, and I know enough to base it at lease loosely on real cities.
However, I don't know how to go about making a map. Any suggestions?
YouTube has tons of videos showing how to make exactly those maps.
Quote from: The Black Ferret;1027610Logic never HAS to apply, but it helps, especially for a game based in a specific city. Even if you don't want to spend a lot of time working out the city's evolution, developing the city's character can help create it from scratch. Gotham, Metropolis, Central City, San Fransokyo all have their own character: the mood, the architectural style, the collective personality of the population. Based on these things, the city should have certain areas, buildings, and a style that compliments them which can be used for the campaign. Run down slums, warehouse districts, gambling zones, high-tech industrial areas. The map and layout can end up looking random, depending on how you make it, but there will usually be centers of activity for specific businesses. For example, you will generally not have a major university in the middle of the dock warehouse district, or a big casino in the midst of a middle-calls suburb. Even if you don't want to give a lot of thought to the history and layout over time, you should at least make sure that the placement of key locales and buildings make sense.
Exactly. I envision a city that is split in two halves, basically- one Metropolis, one Gotham. Metropolis is where the gleaming, hi-tech skyscrapers are, and Gotham has the neo-gothic architecture and crime-ridden areas. Metropolis is where the S.T.A.R. Labs - type mutated monster experiments escape and wreak havoc, and where the laser-gun armed thugs rob the high-end museums and jewelry exchanges. Gotham is where the street-level heroes patrol, and has the mob-infested businesses, slums, and lower-tier villains have their abandoned warehouse hideouts. Occasionally mixing the two could lead to good story-fodder as well. It's the only solution I can think of for the fictionopolis of a Justice-League type team.
Quote from: Redforce;1027749Exactly. I envision a city that is split in two halves, basically- one Metropolis, one Gotham. Metropolis is where the gleaming, hi-tech skyscrapers are, and Gotham has the neo-gothic architecture and crime-ridden areas. Metropolis is where the S.T.A.R. Labs - type mutated monster experiments escape and wreak havoc, and where the laser-gun armed thugs rob the high-end museums and jewelry exchanges. Gotham is where the street-level heroes patrol, and has the mob-infested businesses, slums, and lower-tier villains have their abandoned warehouse hideouts. Occasionally mixing the two could lead to good story-fodder as well. It's the only solution I can think of for the fictionopolis of a Justice-League type team.
Well, in that case, you could do it a few different ways. The core of the city could be the Gotham-esque part and the outer areas between the city center and the outlying suburbs can be the Metropolis area. The Gotham-like center would look old because its the older part of the city and never got beyond it. It could be that way because, say, the old families and businesses that control it are too corrupt and set in their ways to loosen their grip, while the newer, outer regions of the city were more open to new arrivals. So, the old city center fell by the wayside amide its own stodginess, while the rest of the city has moved on and grown around it.
The other possibility is the opposite. The city could have been a major economic power years ago, maybe around the time of the Industrial Revolution, and grew fast. Eventually, that ended and most of the city lost its polish and became run down. Recently, however, drawn to the cheap real estate prices, newer businesses have begun to buy up the metropolitan areas and turn them into advanced, modernized districts, having torn down the old buildings and replaced them with new architecture, creating a new localized boom. Kind of like New Detroit in Robocop, I suppose. So, you have your Metropolis on the inside and Gotham on the outer areas.
A third is to, basically, have two connected cities. It's a variation on the first suggestion, but more extreme. The old city never gave an inch and so all the modernization took place in open real estate right outside the old city borders, essentially building a new city right on the old one's border. I think this is the least realistic of the three, because it basically creates a "Two-Face" city, but if you want to have an equal sized area for both your four-color and Iron-Age type heroes to work with, it does balance the square-foot playing field more than the other two.
Quote from: Redforce;1027749I envision a city that is split in two halves, basically- one Metropolis, one Gotham. Metropolis is where the gleaming, hi-tech skyscrapers are, and Gotham has the neo-gothic architecture and crime-ridden areas.
"Gotham is Manhattan below Fourteenth Street at 3 a.m., November 28 in a cold year. Metropolis is Manhattan between Fourteenth and One Hundred and Tenth Streets on the brightest, sunniest July day of the year." - Denny O'Neil.
Quote from: Redforce;1027516Does this logic apply to superhero fictional cities? Because, to me, those seem to evolve with the needs of the hero's stories and the convenience of the plot - maps are almost always an afterthought.
Possibly not. Though for my Golden Age campaign I used New York as the home base and made ample use of it's different features (as they were in the 1940s!).