Hero Games Maps - What do YOU want to see?

[keithcurtis]

Hi Everyone,

As some of you may know, I'm responsible for most of the maps that have appeared in Hero Games since DoJ resurrected the company. My next major map endeavor (after Sharper than a Serpent's Tooth) will be Fantasy Hero Battlegrounds. Up until now, my philosophy in map design has been to produce the kind of map that I, as a gamer, would like to have.

However, I'd like to know what the Hero community as a whole would like out of a published map. Maybe you've thought of something really cool that has totally escaped me. Maybe there's something I do that totally annoys you. Maybe there's something I do that is confusing that needs to be re-thought, or something cool that I should do more of. I can't promise I'll implement any of your suggestions, but I'd like to hear your input.

Although I have FH: Battlegrounds in mind for this thread, you can talk about maps for any genre.

Before you respond, let me make a couple of things totally clear at the beginning.

1. <B>Please don't ask for maps of specific objects.</B>
I am an artist, not a writer. I have zero control over the content of the books. If you want a castle map, ask the writer of the appropriate book. You could however remark on something about previously published castle maps you hate or like.

2. <B>Hero not be producing to-scale foldout maps.</b>
All maps will have a maximum size of an 8.5" x 11" page.

3. <B>Please don't ask for color.</B>
Hero Games has no current plans to publish in color. It would be nice, but it's not going to happen.

Other than these three points, please feel free to discuss, request, or criticize any aspect of Hero System Maps, particularly the type for FH: Battlegrounds.

Keith "Heroic Cartographer" Curtis

[TheEmerged]

What would I most want to see? To be honest, what I'd most want to see are non-paper maps -- that is, maps on .jpg or somesuch so I can print them out at the scale I want (insert crack about that 8.5 x 11 limitation here).

[keithcurtis]

Have you looked into Shades of Black? The maps there are in postscript format, infinitely superior to jpegs for what you're talking about. The probelm with jpegs and GIFs is that they are not scaleable. If you print them larger, you just get larger pixels.
We went through great pains on SoB to make sure the art remained in a scaleable format. This meant dropping some things like transparency and patterns, but the maps should make clean printouts even if you could print them the size of a football field.

Keith "Adobe Illustrator is my friend" Curtis

[BobGreenwade]

Well, first a disclaimer: I haven't yet seen your work in Champions Battlegrounds. I don't yet own the book, and my first chance to peek at it won't come for another two or three weeks. I therefore have no idea what you've done with this so far, so keep in mind that some of the things I'll bring up may be things you're already doing.

In general, I tend to think of gaming maps in two categories: combat maps, and handouts. Most of what I assume you're talking about is combat maps, so I'll focus on those first.

First, a combat map needs to cover all the area that the combat is likely to take. This includes not only the main building in question, but also the immediately surrounding area. How big "the immediately surrounding area" includes varies according to genre and expected power level, but in most cases an extra city block or two is the most you're likely to have to worry about (and that's at the extreme).

Second, cover all of the major objects that could serve as obstacles, weapons of opportunity, or other complications. Walls, doors, windows, furniture, emplaced weapons, and the like all fall into the "Department of Duh," but don't neglect things like table lamps, kitchen appliances, and other potential weapons of opportunity. I've also run into situations where I needed to know the placement of the breaker box or the water heater in a building. I've even had or seen Champions characters for whom the location of such things as smoke alarms, electrical outlets, microwave ovens, or telephones would make a difference. If you can find some simple way of noting all these on a modern-day map without needing a lot of extra space or cluttering the map too badly, please do.

As to handouts, having at least one in any published adventure is a good thing. For these, verisimilitude is the order of the day -- make it look like what the cartographers of the day would give the PCs. Having seen your work on Savage Earth, I know I don't need to go into any detail about fantasy worlds (except perhaps to make them not necessarily 100% accurate). A modern-day handout map would look like something Rand McNally or some similar company might produce. For something in the future, give it the visual ethic of the future culture.

In both cases, it would be very nice if Hero Games could make the maps from a given book available as downloads in CC2 format -- probably for a nominal fee. The battle maps in particular could then be printed out to scale on a plotter, or with whatever resource the GM has available.

[AnotherSkip]

Notations of light sources could be made, (think thief 1/2) stealth should be an option whenever possible.

I'm not really interested in modern maps ( having many interesting maps from my brother who works at Hilton Hotels)

I will agree with darn well needing archetectural maps including plumbing and wiring (Shadowrunners believe that bathrooms are their best friends) as well as stud spacing (i can easily break through interior walls with my fist in the right palce). However much of this can be either inferred or simply side noted.

Sometimes the way to solve a mission is to be a plumber or electrician.
A gm should not have to scramble to answer some of the questions.
though of course you cannot answer everything.

Do the best that you can to include everything, while not getting it too cluttered.


"Go not to the elves for advice for they shall both say no and yes".-J. R. R. Tolkien

[Monolith]

What I would like to have is a group of maps which break down Millennium City by streets. One map for Downtown, one for Rivertown, etc. That way each district gets coverage. The street breakdowns that GRG did for San Angelo were wonderful. It would be nice to be able to visualize the "sketchy" areas of the Plaza, or just what does Rivertown or the Waterfront looks like. I would also like to see a slightly larger overview of MC, showing exactly where the airport and suburbs are, for example. I would pay good money to have a map of Millennium City in pdf!

[Vondy]

The best map I've ever seen for a fantasy game was the 3-D map of Castle Ravenloft in the original Ravenloft adventure.

[Fitz]

Modular generic maps -- that's what I'd like to see (assuming we're not talking about specific location maps here). Having maps of complete office buildings or taverns or fire stations is all very well, but they get familiar awfully fast.

I'd like to see the equivalent of those architectural prefab planning modules, which can be rearranged and mixed and matched to make new and exciting locations for the PCs to smash to pieces.

That means including add-on pieces like elevator shafts, stairwells, horse troughs, gibbets, death star force field control pylons, etc.etc. as well as the standard 5-sizes-of-rectangular-room bits.

[keithcurtis]

Originally posted by BobGreenwade
Well, first a disclaimer: I haven't yet seen your work in Champions Battlegrounds. I don't yet own the book...

I also have maps in Viper, Coils of the Serpent, Ninja Hero and cartographic maps in Terran Empire, if you have any of those products.

Originally posted by BobGreenwade
First, a combat map needs to cover all the area that the combat is likely to take. This includes not only the main building in question, but also the immediately surrounding area.

I think you'll be happy with some of the maps in STAST. Some of them combine an area map with a blowup of the main battleground.

Originally posted by BobGreenwade
...don't neglect things like table lamps, kitchen appliances, and other potential weapons of opportunity. I've also run into situations where I needed to know the placement of the breaker box or the water heater in a building. I've even had or seen Champions characters for whom the location of such things as smoke alarms, electrical outlets, microwave ovens, or telephones would make a difference. If you can find some simple way of noting all these on a modern-day map without needing a lot of extra space or cluttering the map too badly, please do.

If I focus on a small enough area, say a single room, I think I could include some of those things, light switches or telephones in particular. But I think they might tend to clutter the drawing if I include every last item in the room.

Originally posted by BobGreenwade
...make it look like what the cartographers of the day would give the PCs.

I have tried to do this to some degree. The TE maps for instance use white on black for a lot of the lettering, and I chose a more futuristic font. For FHB, I'm not sure yet what I will do. I am using a vector drawing program, something that looks hand-drawn. But I ill definitely try to capture the flavor of the genre.

Originally posted by BobGreenwade
...it would be very nice if Hero Games could make the maps from a given book available as downloads in CC2 format -- probably for a nominal fee. The battle maps in particular could then be printed out to scale on a plotter, or with whatever resource the GM has available.

Unlikely we will use CC2. It's nice for game maps, but I would never approach a professional printer and ask them to accept such an offbeat format. It's not a professional level graphics program of the stature of say Adobe Illustrator, or Macromedia Freehand. If someone more familiar with the program can correct me on this point, I'd be happy to listen. Also, does CC2 translate files from Illustrator and vice versa? Does it work on a Macintosh?

<HR><HR>

Originally posted by AnotherSkip
Notations of light sources could be made, (think thief 1/2) stealth should be an option whenever possible.

When a light source is not obvious, I try to do so. Chandeliers have been noted on some maps, subway tunnels have had lights indicated on others. When it has some strategic potential, I will try to pay attention to that detail in the future.

Originally posted by AnotherSkip
I will agree with darn well needing archetectural maps including plumbing and wiring (Shadowrunners believe that bathrooms are their best friends) as well as stud spacing (i can easily break through interior walls with my fist in the right palce). However much of this can be either inferred or simply side noted.

Well, I'm not a plumber nor an electrician, so I think such details would be a bit beyond my capabilities. I'm not adverse to throwing in a light switch or two, but do you really playing with that level of detail? Unless you're plotting out exactly the space down to the inch where your character puts his fist, couldn't you just roll a d6 and hit a stud on a 6? I think this would have to fall into the realm of GM winging. I can't provide that level of detail in an accurate and meaningful manner, and I doubt that a GM who could tell the difference would need my feeble attempts.
Also, I doubt Hero games would be willing to pay me for the amount of drawing and research time that would take.


<HR><HR>

Originally posted by Monolith
What I would like to have is a group of maps which break down Millennium City by streets. One map for Downtown, one for Rivertown, etc. That way each district gets coverage. The street breakdowns that GRG did for San Angelo were wonderful.

This comes a little close to asking for specific content, but I though you might be interested in Steve's plans for Hudson City. Although we discussed this over a year ago, I believe Hudson City will have more street detail than MC. I'll have to take a look at San Angelo's street maps; thanks for the reference! For city maps and other non-tactical maps, authors usually have to tread a fine line between giving enough detail to make them playable, and still have enough grey area to allow GMs to customize or future authors to include their own ideas.

<HR><HR>

Finally, Fitz, that sounds like a cool product and one I'd like to work on. But like I said, I'm just the artist. I have no control over what they assign me to map.

Keith "Thanks folks, keep 'em coming!" Curtis

[Daryl]

Thanks for soliciting opinions, Keith. I'm not a fantasy gamer, but I am interested in maps for other genres (anything modern, really).

I didn't buy Battlegrounds because there weren't electronic versions of the maps. What I most want from electronic maps are these features (in order of importance):

1. Scalable (PostScript, like you already mentioned, or even better, PDF).

2. Editable: individual elements can be selected and modified in Adobe Illustrator or similar package. It's not helpful if the object is all one path.

3. Broken into 8.5x11 sections that can easily be stitched together when printed or copy and pasted into larger formats

4. In color (just because they would be printed in the books in black and white doesn't mean we have to forego color in the files).

--d

[Insaniac99]

there is only ONE thing I care about for the maps (I'll find out some use for them one way or another)

I want DUrability! I haven't used the orriginal maps that came with the resource kit because I'm afraid of getting a tear or spill on them, I want maps that can double as a table cloth for even the messiest eaters!

[farik]

my pet peeve about the resource kit maps was the scale. If the map is a HERO product and it has hexes I want the hexes to represent 1" in game terms if that means the hexes need to be smaller or larger so be it.

[keithcurtis]

Originally posted by farik
my pet peeve about the resource kit maps was the scale. If the map is a HERO product and it has hexes I want the hexes to represent 1" in game terms if that means the hexes need to be smaller or larger so be it.

I agree to a point. I have always tried to provide a scaled hex grid in every map. Sometimes the maps are of city sections or other large areas. In those cases, I have either forgone a grid or made the hexes equal some easy multiple of standard, such as x3, x5 or x10. If the hexes need to be a sixteenth of an inch to remain in scale, then they would only be confusing.

There was a section of Michigan in Shades of Black where I used 1 km mega hexes just in case anyone had a megascaled power.

In any case, I agree totally that a realistic scale is paramount.

Keith "hexed" Curtis

[Bartman]

Originally posted by farik
my pet peeve about the resource kit maps was the scale. If the map is a HERO product and it has hexes I want the hexes to represent 1" in game terms if that means the hexes need to be smaller or larger so be it.

Mine is somewhat similar. Make sure that the scale for everything is correct. Far too many maps have had 6' wide chairs, 18' long dining tables in apartments, 12' long beds, 100' long hallways in suburban homes, etc. If 2m = 1" then make sure everything fits that scale. Nothing throws me off a map more than inconsistancies in scale.

Note: Keith this is not at all intended to necessarily criticise your maps. I'm not GMing anything at the moment. And at my GMs request I have avoided looking at Battlegrounds and SoB. So I can't say if they have had the same problems as many previous maps.

[mattingly]

I like the angled view from the HSRK, instead of the top-down view.