World map teaser

[Gurluas]

Mss concept artist Zii proudly presents, an Mss production:

The World map!, this is a teaser, the full version includes all of Daragoth.
This map does NOT include underground evels.

http://www.thezii.com/images/etc/worldMap_prg10.jpg

 

[HVR]

Looks great!

 

[Thothie]

What do ye be using to make that?

 

[J-M v2.5.5]

We have a concept artist named Zii. She's drawing everything by hand. Next to that, I guess she uses something like Photoshop to colour the map.

 

[Thothie]

Darn, thought Little-G had done it himself, and come accross one hell of a map generator. Oh well. Looks good!

 

[zeus9860]

Looks good and interisting to me.

 

[Gurluas]

Alot of effort has to be put into it, however keep in mind that this map takes place 15 years after Msc, so you may notice some incosistencies.

 

[Tentadrilus]

I'm glad that sfor is known as Eswen Mallan rather than The Spooky Forest.

p.s. Can you rename "Wicard Oven" to "Wicard Coven" or something, because it just sounds like some sort of bakery.

 

[Thothie]

Might also want to leave more room on your continent, or poor Zii's going to run into the same nightmare I have, even without the underground maps. "Can't... Cram... Maps... Into... Map..."

 

[Gurluas]

We will expand into other continents which will mostly be player based except for what is already in lore
(Valen forexample, only two regions are known)

We have mapped Daragoth out, i guess theres still room for islands, the only one we have right now is Dalya Haven.

As for Wicard Oven...I dont know, i'd rather keep the original but we'll see.

And Eswen Mallan is an elven name i requested from Lanethan :3

 

[Thraxis]

Just a random question. Should we expect say half of these playable at launch?

Great job on the world map art though Make sure to pass that along for me.

 

[Gurluas]

Not at launch.

 

[Hemeriodius]

What happened to those mountains in north above Eswen Sylen?

Also why is Wicard Oven all the way over near Deralia? Wicardoven in MSC has a transition at the end to the Aluhandra desert
and is connected to challs which runs under Eswen Mallen.

 

[Stoned]

Why not rename WICARD OVEN to WicarDOVEN, thats how I always pronounced it.

 

[TheOysterHippopotami]

This map looks really good. However, where is Gertenheld? It does not appear like the shape of this continent is the same as the one in MSC either.

Also, Thothie, is it really that hard to add more maps (especially town maps)? What you should do is cluster the existing maps we have closer together. That will make more room for new maps, plus it will make Daragoth feel more realistic. On these maps it appears like Helena is hundreds, if not thousands of miles away from Edana. If you take the Edana and Thornlands areas (and those maps who connect to them) and move them closer to Helena (and in turn, move the helena region slightly closer to Deralia) you will have opened a vast amount of space in which to add new maps.

Also, I really hate how you can walk from thornlands to bloodrose and then suddenly you can walk to the Aluhandra desert. I really feel like you need to cluster old maps together and add new 'in-betweener' maps so that the entire world doesn't seem like it's roughly the size of a football field.

This is Master Swords largest flaw in my opinion.

 

[Rickler]

Also why is Wicard Oven all the way over near Deralia? Wicardoven in MSC has a transition at the end to the Aluhandra desert

Well for one wicardoven is a 3rd party map so it shouldn't be a key map in getting to the desert. In fact wicardoven wouldn't of been included if it hadn't been for gurluas writing it into the lore.

This map looks really good. However, where is Gertenheld?

Gertenheld is also a 3rd party map.

It does not appear like the shape of this continent is the same as the one in MSC either.

How so? Thothie's beta map is pretty close... desert to the west, coldness to the north. Difficulty gets harder as the player travels north.

 

[TheOysterHippopotami]

How so? Thothie's beta map is pretty close... desert to the west, coldness to the north. Difficulty gets harder as the player travels north.

The coast near daragoth is more intricate in MSC, I think. The skybox in maps like skycastle and keledrosruins portray a large inlet with a town that I have been told is deralia on one part, what looks to be 'the wall' up on the mountains, and a lighthouse that I assumed was gertenheld cape. That is the only big difference I find. For the most part this map seems spot on, and is really quite beautiful.

Also, the banner on the top of the MSC forums also portrays an inlet near the coast where deralia is located.

 

[CrazyMonkeyDude]

Also, the banner on the top of the MSC forums also portrays an inlet near the coast where deralia is located.

*cough* I'd just like to take this moment to point out that the banner is in no way a representation of the world of Leann. It's actually the banner that came with the skin, with the two zone names from Outlands that are easily visible wiped out. Quite badly at that >_>

 

[Gurluas]

Also about the skybox, all I have to say is: Most of it is not made for ms and what was looking good was just slapped on.
In Mss the game world will be much more immersive and will have clear rules as to what is official and what is not.

Technically im in charge of what is canon and what is not in mss

As for msc the only real direct developement i have done for it are a few skins and the next version of Nashalrath. which I believe should be in the feb ptch if Thothie tested it and it worked.

 

[TheOysterHippopotami]

Bong - I did not know this. (obviously)

Gurluas - That skybox was NOT custom made for MSC? I had been told that it was, which is why I mentioned it. If it truly wasn't made for msc, I must say, I am truly disappointed. That was one hell of a skybox.

Can you elaborate on what you meant when you said the game world will be more immersive? And what you meant when you said there will be clear rules to what is official and what is not?

As for Nashalrath, what has been done with it? From what I gather by reading your posts Nashalrath is an important lore related map. Would it not be better to just leave the current map as it is, call it something else, and make a new, even better map and call that Nashalrath? I have always felt that the integral lore related maps should be of the highest quality and everything else should be filler maps. That said, the current Nashalrath is absolutely beautiful.

We really do have a shortage of maps in this game and because of that the world appears to be really small. Like I mentioned earlier, we need way more in-betweener maps to make the world feel more filled out.

Also, way off topic but I still cannot sign up for the MSS forums. The code I have to enter to prove that I am not a bot is completely illegible no matter how many times I refresh it. I don't know how anybody is able to make it past the registration process.

 

[Gurluas]

With immersive i mean you will feel as if you're part of the world.
You wont just enter a random map and kill shit, there will be questlines leading you around Leann.
And when custom maps will be allowed (mostly islands, and other continents)
We will go great lengths to tie every single map in the whole game directly into the lore of the world.

And as for Nashalrath, the current map is perfect for what i wanted, thing is... J was not in the mood for mapping, and Thothie did not care or did not have time, so some very very very important elements were not added or ignored, i have fixed this in the next release myself, you will notice new dialogue, and no bludgeons as they are not canon.

Mss wont tie exactly in with the lore of Msc due to some inconsistencies, you can read about it in the thread discussing Tendradilius, Tendralius, Tendrati......whatever's edits of the wiki in the general forum.

 

[Hemeriodius]

And when custom maps will be allowed (mostly islands, and other continents)

Other continents? I thought there where only supposed to be two, Daragoth and Valen. I agree with Oyster we need to fill darahoth in more to make it seem larger, daragoth as depicted by that concept map looks really small and boring.

 

[Thothie]

Also why is Wicard Oven all the way over near Deralia? Wicardoven in MSC has a transition at the end to the Aluhandra desert

Well for one wicardoven is a 3rd party map so it shouldn't be a key map in getting to the desert. In fact wicardoven wouldn't of been included if it hadn't been for gurluas writing it into the lore.

This map looks really good. However, where is Gertenheld?

Gertenheld is also a 3rd party map.

Ah, but so is Shahaddar palace, mon ami.

Actually, Wicard Oven, unlike Shahaddar Palace, does get mentioned by Lanethan, and it's in some way related to the Halls of Carthane - which is why I hacked the transition there.

*Technically* Keledrosruins and The Dangerous Pass are third party too. Even though they are part of MSC, they are not a part of MS. If Brandon hadn't been free to abandon the lore and do his own map concepts, they never would have happened.

Seems, of all the things that make Mastersword Mastersword, the shape of the continent would be the least among them. I tore the geographic mythology apart when I moved some of the final areas to the north (they were originally in the western deserts, a few on a separate continent), so I don't see an issue there. I've always been for getting as many maps as possible into the game, so I'd expect Little-G's map to be considerably less crowded. However, as a result, the game will attract fewer mappers (being unable to apply their own concepts) and have considerably less life span.

I *suspect* as the dev team moves on/decays, however, that much as happened with MSC (going from 11 maps to 50+), that the restrictions will get laxed, and the world will again expand at its own rate.

A river would be nice though - something that runs through large sections of the game world, to tie it together a bit more. Wanted that for MSC, but never could arrange the maps in such a way to work it out.

 

[Thothie]

Also, I really hate how you can walk from thornlands to bloodrose and then suddenly you can walk to the Aluhandra desert. I really feel like you need to cluster old maps together and add new 'in-betweener' maps so that the entire world doesn't seem like it's roughly the size of a football field.

Where can you do that?

You can go from Bloodrose to Aleyesu, the ruins of Aleyesu protrude into Blood Rose at the entrance there to. Granted, the grass is a bit greener than it should be, but I think custom transition textures may have been beyond Foamy's mapping capacity at the time (similar with the entrance to the Frozen Summit, which is at least up the side of a mountain in Bloodrose).

The MSC world is a bit haphazard, but most of the transitions look the part, or have some hint of the destination about them. The consistency is actually pretty impressive, given the diversity.

 

[TheOysterHippopotami]

I present to you, Thothie, my 1337 photo editing skillz!



I think it is quite feasible to cluster those maps together like that.

Also, at least according to this map, Bloodrose doesn't even connect to Aleyesu at all. Why not just 'pretend' that those ruins in bloodrose are actually the ruins of the city Melanion? It would be nice if that transition didn't go straight to the heart of melanion, though, but rather the outskirts. Then connect the outskirts to the ruins itself and that region will appear much larger.


Another thing I am not too fond of is how quickly you go from low level maps like thornlands to high level maps like bloodrose. Of course, I am not recommending you move bloodrose. Instead I just think more low level material should be added to the map itself so that bloodrose becomes a 5-15 level map with a high level sidequest. The outskirts of melanion could then be made for levels 10-20 and then melanion itself could be 30-40. This way the game would progress more naturally. That is my opinion at least.

At some point, when I have this articulated a little better I plan on suggesting it in the suggestion forums in hopes of starting a larger discussion. I kind of feel like im being incoherent at the moment (if only slightly) so I'll wait on that for a bit.