Current
Strategic Map of Germany
My
latest project is to replace the campaign maps.
I
designed the original maps to make them practical for transferring from the
campaign to the wargames table.
There
are different types of maps. The
largest cover all of Europe. Plus one
for France, Germany and Spain. On these
maps each square covers an area of 15 square miles. This is one days march; it is also one
wargames table.
The
maps are so large that it is difficult to read them, without using the zoom
option on the computer. On the blog it
is quite difficult to make out cities and towns, even with the zoom.
In
addition they are not very pretty. I am
not very artistic, as my maps clearly demonstrate. And because they were designed to be so
functional they are even less attractive than they might be.
New
Strategic Map of Germany
So
I have redesigned them to show much less detail. For my own information I will still use the
old maps. But this type of map will be
sent to each commander, and used on the campaign diary blog.
On
this map each square covers an area of 45 square miles. So each one will be a whole campaign phase
that is nine wargame tables.
All
of the maps used by the campaign commanders will be in this style. I will make duplicates of each map to show
the exact table terrain, but they will not be sent to the players.
I
have made two of these maps, one with major roads and this one without. I am not sure which to use for the
campaign. The major roads show best
route between cities, and would follow the traditional campaign areas.
There
is still a lot of work to do. I have
made one tactical map using this style, and I quite like it. But I am not sure whether to introduce them
during the current campaign, or to wait for the end of a phase and introduce
them for the next phase. That makes
more sense, but it would mean that I will be dealing with both types of maps
until all five campaign areas have completed a phase.
Not sure about the maps scales. If it becomes too abstract, what are we going to ponder about? Sure the squares do produce a bit of odd stuff.
ReplyDeleteYou could consider cyberboard to help you / ease your life doing maps. Even if not having all players to use it ( which might not be bad) you can take the maps from it ( print screen). By loading existing games you can save a lot of tiles which you re use making your life easier.
jc
Hi JcDanville
ReplyDeleteThese maps are only to show the overall campaign
They are not meant to provide a lot of information
Although they do contain the name of the major town in each square
The strategic maps cover a much smaller area, and provide more information
The tactical maps are the real campaign maps.
They cover an area similar to the 100 days campaign
They show the exact terrain which will appear on the wargames table
Having set up the outline of each type of map, filling in the detail is not too complicated.
The whole thing is designed from the wargames table back to the map
So each campaign map has to be a "one off"