I'm pretty new to Campaign Cartographer -- or, rather, I've owned the software for ages but I'm new to actually making maps.

I keep saying I bought the software five years ago, but upon reflection, I think it was around 2016. Eight years ago! I played around a bit with Fractal Terrains, but everything was so intimidating! I had this idea that I could just fiddle around and learn it through trial and error, much like I've learned various desktop publishing and illustration programs and over the years. Didn't work! I didn't grasp the approach of choosing what you want to do and then picking the objects you want to do it to. It was counterintuitive and opposite of the image editing software I've used before, where you select the object and then select what you want to do with it.

I thought I could sit down and read the PDFs and learn that way. Nope! Every time I tried to map something, it looked nothing like the pretty pictures I'd see here. (Pro Tip: Even when you understand that sheet effects exist, you still have to turn sheet effects on to see the pretty effects!)

Finally in mid-2023, I decided to watch one of the tutorials. I started with one of the then-more recent Lives, and that was way too advanced, but it gave me a hint at CC3+'s tremendous power and potential. Then I found Joe Sweeney's tutorials, and everything clicked. His "Parrot Island" tutorial gave me a basic foundation, and then I plowed through the rest of his, and then ProFantasy's more "Intro to CC3"-type tutorials and the brief videos about specific functions and techniques before making my way back to the Live videos.

I was fiddling around with map-making in the second half of 2023, but mostly it was to practice specific techniques rather than design a proper map. I created an account on these forums in December of 2023 and posted my first attempt at a proper map (my Castle on a Cloud) in January of 2024 -- mere months ago!

I still watch the Lives every time there's a new one (and I always, always learn something new). I was watching the old ones in the downtime, but I think I've watched almost every single Live already (a few more than once, especially when there's something I want to attempt that I remember Ralf or Remy demonstrating). I've also watched Jim Sweeney's, Dogtag's, Remy's, and Joachim de Ravenbel's tutorials as well. (I find it quite peaceful and Zen to watch a blank canvas get turned into a work of art in under an hour!)

Let’s climb up to the second landing, where we are standing on the roof of level 12 facing the side of level 13. There are eight entrances, one on either side of the four exterior stairs. The entrances in the northwest and southeast quadrants go straight ahead into level 13, while the entrances on the southwest and northeast quadrants immediately descend down 10-foot side stairs to level 12.

Level 13

No one actually lives in the temple. There are no kitchens or similar facilities. Even so, occasionally people are allowed to spend the night there. High ranking priests may sleep there after a late-night religious rites, or the night before an early morning religious service. Pharaohs sleep there the night before their coronations, and sometimes on other occasions. Level 13 has four bedrooms set up. Towards the center, there are interior stairs ascending to Level 14 and descending to Level 12.

Let’s go up, and then we will make our way back down.

Level 14

This level has three more bedrooms, plus a fourth room with a strange design carved into the floor tiles. (Is it a summoning circle? A teleportation portal?) Stairs in the center ascend to 15 and descend to 13.

Level 15

This level has three treasure chambers, all connected through a central room where guards are stationed. Stairs ascend to Level 16 and descend to Level 14.

Level 16

This level has a large 30x30 foot chapel in the center of the level. Three side rooms are dressing chambers for the priests. They are sparsely furnished, but have chests containing the priests’ vestments.

The chapel is 20 feet high, cutting into Level 17. A crude representation of the sun (looking more like a bullseye target) is painted on the floor in gold leaf. There are no stairs going up, because there is nothing above this level except for the upper half of this chapel. Here’s what it looks like from Level 17:

There is nothing on Level 18. It’s just solid stonework.

Let’s make our way back down to Level 13 and use the interior stairs to descend to Level 12.

If the ProFantasy Gods are listening: a future annual that I think could really complement the Marine Dungeons would be a "Jungle Adventures" dungeon. It would provide an opportunity to bring in palm trees and coconuts that could also enhance Marine Dungeons. Maybe some swamp building tools, including tree trunks with the ripples used in Marine Dungeons? Lots of colorful jungle foliage. Maybe some giant mosquitos or other bugs? Alligators or crocodiles? Think of the Indiana Jones-inspired adventures! Golden idols! Whips and fedora hats! Aztec-inspired ruins. Maybe a perfectly round boulder for traps. (The opening scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark is my favorite action/adventure opening scene of all time.) Just planting an idea....

Thank you, that was a very useful suggestion for the ones with a full-body varicolor option. (I tried experimenting with Adjust Hue/Saturation, Colorize, and RGB Matrix Process, but those effects don't work on raster symbols.) I will also look through my other symbol sets for more creatures. Great suggestion!

I am really liking this Parchment style for large-scale maps. I don't think it would suit my campaign world overall, but I can see my adventurers finding an ancient map in this style in some crumbling ruins, or being given one in this style when they consult with a sage or wizard for advice.

I met Anne McCaffrey some years ago and she urged those in attendance to compile and keep a list of names which we could draw upon whenever we needed one. That practice has stuck with me all these years later, and I have lists of thousands of names I can use.

That's what I do, too. Unusual last names are good fodder for fantasy realm names of people or geographic places, though I sometimes tweak the spelling. I keep a notepad list on my phone that jot down names as I encounter them. Every so often, I paste the list into Excel where I can make notations when I use a name.

Thank you for the tip -- I will check out Fandom.com. I actually started my own wiki about my world of Adnati on my WordPress-powered website. I use a plugin called Yadawiki for the wiki functionality. The Religion section is the most developed, followed by Geoscience. (History so far covers ancient history but not so much "modern" history.) I have tons more plotted out in MS Word docs that have not yet made it onto the wiki, much of which would have to be kept private until players learn those elements of the world.

Now that I am finally starting to learn CC3+ and FT+ (after owning the software for about six years but being too intimidated to learn it), I can finally start doing some mapping. (I decided about six months ago to start watching the tutorials and surprise, surprise, learned so much more than I did on my own with the PDF manuals.)

I don't actually have any players at the moment. Just having fun worldbuilding. But I have a fully fleshed out concept of how the players will meet, the circumstances that get them into a group and kick-off the story, and the major elements (and end goal) of their campaign arc.

Here are two samples with the full range of Solid Bitmaps 10 through 90, plus a solid black polygon. The first is Sue's first suggestion and the second adds her second tip.

Edge Fade, Inner - Edge Width 2.5, Inner Opacity 80, Outer Opacity 25

Edge Fade, Inner - Edge Width 2.5, Inner Opacity 80, Outer Opacity 25 plus Glow Radius bumped to 0.5

I think bumping the Glow radius to 0.5 is nice. And these are working nicely, so I don't think I will try importing other water fills to see if any of them work. I'm leaning towards Solid 90 because for my poor eyes at least, I really have to zoom in on the pure solid one to see the stonework behind the water.

Thank you for your help, Sue! Looking forward to plotting out my main city's sanitation system over the next few weeks. Sewers make for such great adventure options -- emergency exits when you're being besieged, or for plotting out heists. I imagine a lot of crime lords dump a lot of evidence (and bodies) in the sewers...

There were already separate threads seeking advice on the Parchment Maps and Jerion Shading approaches. I wanted to share a little about my technique for the Mike Schley style, including things that I would do differently next time.

I wanted to have some contours consistent with the other maps, so I opened the Jerion export and copied one of the contour areas onto the Schley map, just where the Jerion contour colors started to turn brown (I think around 5,000 or 7,000 feet in elevation). Playing with a technique that Ralf showed in the Jeriod shading demo, I moved that contour to a contour sheet and changed the fill to the Solid 10 fill. I added Edge Fade, Inner and Transparency effects to that sheet. I then created a second contour sheet with the same effects, and did the same thing with a somewhat higher elevation (I think it was around 11,000 feet in elevation). That worked well. I liked how it gave shading and depth without being too intense like a bevel effect would have done.

Here's what I did next that I would do differently next time. First, I look an even higher level of elevation and did the same thing. But instead of putting it on a contours sheet with a Solid 10 fill, I put it on a Land Features Hills Background sheet and changed it to the Hills Background fill style. I also added a Transparency effect to that sheet. And then I did the same with an even higher elevation, putting it on a Land Features Mountain Background and changing the fill style to the Mountain Background fill. At this point, the file got massively big. I think it had a lot of nodes to contend with. Next time I try this approach, I might still do the two Solid 10 contour imports, but instead of also importing contour lines for the hills and mountains, I will draw them on using a JPG image of the original export as a rough guide for where to draw them.

Here are a few zoomed in maps in the Jerion shading style: