Earth, but Different

Thanks guys, I am brand new to this, and I am finding this to be a lot like learning a new language which is something I have done in the past. By that I mean that there are ways to get something done, but the exact result of what I am doing and what that means in 20 steps are unclear. So I want to come to the forums while I am researching this and try and find the pit falls and the setting changes that I will want before I get to them. Here is a list of what I want to do...

I want to use a map of the earth as it is now and either change it to a world with far less water on it due to an ice age, or I want to be able to take a map and roughly draw the different parts of the planet that are well known and be able to show the parts that are less well known as I see it in my mind. These places would be what lies under the water for the most part, and what lies within the earth itself.

This is a starting point I would like to work with, but there are a few problems...

Right now FT3 has a saved file called Earth, but the file does not seem as detailed as a generated world, just sitting there I can see differences, and when I zoom in it far less detailed than the other maps that are made. One of the things I will be wanting to do is to Export World using the Multiple File function. If I use the 3 or 4 level version of that I would like that to have a reasonable amount of detail to work with when I am in CC3. If I am working with rough shapes than I might as well build my own in CC3 or try and raise the terrain in FT3 to get the shapes I am wanting.

This is being done for a Homebrew world based in the Shadowrun world, basically I am saying that I do not want to use their 22 years worth of their built history, and I want to use something I know with a twist as all Shadowrun things should have. I will be focusing at first on the North Americas as that is where the players are located now, and it will give them a since of familiarity that is important in games when they are new and when you are making a lot of changes to a world that has a setting. However, in the future I do plan to expand that out to other parts of the world as they travel and explore this world, so having these other maps based on the same world or being able to show them in a larger map will be great for referencing as the group makes travel plans.



Thanks for any help,
Clark

Comments

  • JimPJimP 🖼️ 280 images Cartographer
    edited April 2016
    Making detailed world size maps can overload your cmoputer and slow it way down. For my hemisphere maps of Crestar, I made nations, oceans, continents and some islands. Mountain ranges, and a few rivers. The Northern hemisphere isn't as detailed as its new. Keeping symbols to an absolute minimum is a good idea as well. Otherwise redraw times can zoom upwards. I typically uise colors at this scale to show forests and mountain ranges.

    The Northern one original map is 1200 pixels wide, the Southern original is 1400 pixels wide. I've shrunk them to meet board requirements.
  • JimPJimP 🖼️ 280 images Cartographer
    edited April 2016
    I then put the details on country level. This is at the bottom of the Southern hemisphere's continent, the large bay.
  • MonsenMonsen Administrator 🖼️ 81 images Cartographer
    Posted By: ClarkRight now FT3 has a saved file called Earth, but the file does not seem as detailed as a generated world
    Go get the ETOPO1 data set and import it into FT3. This is a high resolution dataset. For import into FT3, you'll want the cell-registered binary integer version. This should give you a reasonably detailed earth.
  • Thanks to everyone who has posted, I am in the process of trying to get some of these suggestion to work. Monsen I am not able to figure out how to import those files into FT3. I have down loaded several file groups that might be right, and when I look for a way to import them I do not see an import option. I see an Export, and under New -> Binary -> Browse I see where I could use a file if it had the right format. I think I am close I am just missing something.

    The main reason I am wanting to work from a single map and then focus down onto it while keeping scale is the world I am running stretches the imagination as it is, and I want to root it in logic that doesn't look made up. Maybe I am over thinking it, and I should just start with a region and work outward from there.


    I have also thought I would have the world erupt into massive changes with volcanoes and earth quakes so that the earth's map doesn't have to match exactly, and I can just make something on FT3.

    Thanks again
    Clark
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