TSG Big Map

[TKS-2009ce]

Thank you very much for the reply.

1. Coastline
First of all, I'm not a geographer but working on the related field, so I know all those things. And still, I am not comfortable with that formation. Your examples shown here are also small scale ones, the order of km. The map we are talking about reaches probably more than 100 or 200km from edge to edge. Go to Google maps or somewhere and zoom out to that scale, you will see how your examples look like in the map. Of course, subsided coastlines of much larger scale can exist, but I don't think it fits to that area. The NE of river mouth has relatively smooth shoreline and it looks like that area is relatively flat. That means that area is not the subsided one. It is possible, but not very common that the geographical feature suddenly changes at the river mouth. That's why I don't support your theory.

Another possible explanation is; the west bank of the river prevents the river run to the westward, such as there is hills and mountains. I prefer this explanation but I don't think there is enough space in the west bank of the river to have hills and mountains. Of course, anything can be possible, but I don't like that narrow section.

Overall, it is nice to have some reason in the formation of geography, but I, personally, don't think this is quite successful. If you want to implement coastline features commonly seen in England, then I suggest you go to Green Isle. It looks like a subsided one to me.

To Cloud;
It is not an important issue here if the sediment is composed mainly by sand or pebble. The mechanism behind the formation of that kind of shoreline is the same. Of course, there are several significant difference between sandy beaches and pebble beaches, but not in the case here. The sediments are drifted down by the wave force and nearshore current according to the predominant direction of incoming waves. In your example, it goes from left-hand side to right-hand side and it forms a straight line. That's the same.

2. Distance
First, I doubt about the marching speed can be a good reference scale in this world. I don't think all the campaign creators consider the distance and marching speed very carefully in their works (and I don't think it is something the creator must do).
I'm quite sure that the marching speed through the completely native forest is very very low. You have to cut down trees and so on to make a path. I heard that in WWII, japanese troops could only get couple hundred meters of advance after struggling all day to cut down trees to make a path in the jungle of New Guinea and some other islands in the south. However, the south forest here is not the case like that, I think. Elves walk around this forest occasionally (Ethiliel told to Deoran they do), so there should be some sort of trail in the forest, I think, up to the black river. Also some bandits know those trails. Those paths are not so nice as the road in the realm of wesnoth, but it certainly helps a lot for marching (you don't have to cut down trees). So, I think it certainly slows down the speed, but not slow like snail.

The province of Kerlath is a new province opened recently. Fort Tahn is the southern most "border" outpost, according to the geographical guide in the website. So, I don't believe a lot of people had lived in the south of Fort Tahn before. I think, after the age of turmoil, people started to migrate to the south of Fort Tahn. The history of wesnoth doesn't mention anything about the beginning of migration, but I guess it was around the same time that the people started to migrate to Estmark, which is YW 530 according to the history page, or probably later than that because Estmark is closer to Weldyn. TSG occurs YW 608, so it is only 70 or 80 years from the beginning of cultivation, at most. If you compare to the size of Estmark, I don't think it is too small.
I put the comparison between Kerlath and Estmark. The east of the hill is the territory of the undead and black dots represent where Gweddry and Dacyn came out from the tunnel and where Elvish country is, so I think this is the reasonable size of area where humans made colonies between YW530 and YW 625, which is longer than the history of Kerlath. You compared the size with Elensefar, but I don't think that was a good choice to be compared with.
The old map displays that Westin locates at almost the southern most place where people had already turned into the farmland. If you look at the circle I put in Kerlath, there is enough area that people can cultivate farmlands in 60 or 70 years between Fort Tahn and Westin. And there is much more space in the east of that circle. I don't think there is not enough farmland in Kerlath in my map, I think your map is too large.

3. Vale of Tears
I thought the vale of blossoming trees was the name of area and the only name for that place, and the vale of tears is just the title of scenario. The vale of blossoming trees was occupied by bandits and undead, and Mebrin was kidnapped, therefore it was called "tear". Am I wrong?

I think finally I answered everything.
Thank you very much for your attention.

[melinath]

On an unrelated note, the geography for the far north doesn't make a shred of sense (a desert next to a forest?!).

WINR... but I have to admit that I like it to be close when possible. Geology doesn't really change how it works. Maybe someday the map of the North could be redone...? (If someone volunteers for the massive and not strictly necessary task.)

TKS: I like your analysis of the river and the farmland! Awesome that someone with knowledge in a related area (what area, if I may ask?) would take an interest in this.

That being said, I think you may have missed the point on why medieval armies are slow. Short version: It's not because they're going through the forest, it's just because they're massive and get easily bogged down. (Though going through the forest probably doesn't help.)

I agree with you that distances are important and should be considered and not just made up for convenience and dramatic impact. Though I don't have the knowledge or energy to do the finding of logical problems or the thinking up of solutions.

[Deusite]

It's also worth mentioning that the South Guard was written before there was any canonised geography AFAIK, or at least something very different from now. The black river was originally the great river.

I'm all for revising the geography of the far north, although I suppose it doesn't help that I haven't played through all of SotBE. However, we are not without a previous map of the far north from Kestenvarn, even though it differs from the current version. WINR will have to apply for that of course, I don't think a real life cold blooded creature like a lizard/saurian should be able to live up there. Maybe we could go a step further and decide where the elusive desert is.

I'm not 100% content with the coastline, since it's irrelevant for the campaign it would be easier just to crop off some of it. I just don't want to have to redraw all of it. The original coastline in my version is the original from Kestenvarn.

Edit: The vale is the Vale of Blossoming Trees in the scenario, and the Vale of Tears in the title and objectives. It could mean anything or nothing, that's more something for lore extraction and the revisions afterwards, but it's good to know what's the difference so we can be certain about what it is/they are on the map.

A revision for a draft will come when I next get the chance to raid my dad's laptop.

[TKS-2009ce]

I had just skimmed through the thread you linked and read it from the point you made a link, and today I found I missed several things so that maybe I brought some confusion here. Therefore, I apologize for that first. I, however, don't think I made a wrong or pointless discussion in above.

I found the discussion in the original thread about the distance, but I don't like the approach he took. I mean, putting a scale on the map, defining the distance exactly how much people can walk in a day and how many days it takes, and those things. I don't think the quantitative approach is the best way to convince people in the game like this. I think the qualitative approach is better in order to leave some degree of freedom. I think it is just good enough if it looks reasonable, in this kind of situation. I guess that means WINR, right?
Melinath, if my english was confusing, I apologize to you. English in not my native tongue.

Anyway, the reason I didn't emphasized on the marching speed in general is the same. So, I just looked at the relativeness (relativity?) between the marching speed on the well maintained road and small trail in the forest, not the absolute quantity of the speed. Fixing the values in those things will cause conflicts in the existing works and reduce the degree of freedom for future works.

Is there any description saying Fort Tahn is a big city? If not, we can make any reasoning why any news was not sent to Weldyn for long time.
Say for example, Fort Tahn itself is isolated from the populated area and It doesn't seem there is any kind of being who can or would like to make a frequent trade with humans (like many border cities in real world). So, it had been just a fort to watch the southern border for long time (with small supporting city, though). The city got more population at the beginning of migration, but as the colonists push the frontier to the south, the importance of the city got declined. And finally when Westin becomes the capital of the province, Fort Tahn becomes just a small local city. The HQ of border guards also moved to Westin when TSG is founded, and now only small garrison troop is stationed in the city. Therefore, nobody could make effective reaction when the HQ at Westin got corrupted... and so on.
I don't know if this makes sense to everybody but even if it doesn't, it doesn't matter. Somebody can make better explanation than my example. Well, my point is, the text in TSG has several glitch to be fixed (the biggest one to me is being said that Deoran is the son of Haldiel (from HttT), who lived almost hundred years before from the time. Not related to the geographic thing though), so any reasonable explanation can be made later. Rather than worrying about those things, I prefer to make the map something like explaining the situation in the big picture first (at least in this case).

According to the geographic guide, there is a dense forest in the south of Fort Tahn. So, Human colonists turned it into farmland through the migration. This matches to the line spoken by Naga, I think. So, I prefer to following the old map setting (and make some reasoning why the new didn't send immediately if you are worried about it so much) rather than putting some wasteland between Fort Tahn and Westin (or Kerlath province).

Another thing is; I prefer to keep the black river somewhat mysterious, rather than by drawing its entire shape but by run out from the map border.

Thank you very much for reading another long post,

[Deusite]

We don't have to be overly accurate in the details of how far they can travel, as long as it looks right. Personally I think a scale is quite useful for that.

The manual says that fort Tahn controls access across the R.Aethen, which seems odd because it looks quite far away from the river. The manual itself can easily be changed, it's likely to be fairly out of date by now. This is a good opportunity to add to the lore, fort Tahn included. What you say about it is a fairly good assumption.

Revised (messy) draft following your version. I connected the vale to the river Aethen bescause of the stream in the scenario map. There are more hills so that they are more cohesive. The forest needs to become less dense as it gets further north because it is only the leftovers of the Heart Wood, so it's receding.

There's also a very isolated outpost in this map (down and left of the heart river label) because of a scenario, 6a I think. The mountains are supposedly populated by bandits so for now I say that this outpost deals with capturing them and guarding the hills.

I have a mind to completely get rid of that river in the top right. It doesn't make sense to me. There is the issue of it being on the main map though. I might also move the heart river down a bit

[mabeenot]

Will the label for the Heart Wood be placed closer to the center of the forest? Right now, it looks like the part north of the Heart River is the Heart Forest while the southern half is a separate unnamed forest.

[TKS-2009ce]

That (of course) looks much better for me. Good work. Thanks.

There's also a very isolated outpost in this map (down and left of the heart river label) because of a scenario, 6a I think. The mountains are supposedly populated by bandits so for now I say that this outpost deals with capturing them and guarding the hills.

You mean the outpost which Sir Gerrick had to reach in that scenario? Then, my intention to put a river running N-S at that location was to put that outpost at the north end of that river (or close to it). If you don't think it is complete nonsense, I prefer to putting that output more north to the current location (preferably at the north end of the stream).

I have a mind to completely get rid of that river in the top right. It doesn't make sense to me. There is the issue of it being on the main map though. I might also move the heart river down a bit

I guess you are talking about the one I disconnected from the river running westward and turned it to SE. I guess you felt it nonsense due to the original sketch being painted with brown color SE of it. But, I think that sketch is just a sketch and don't think the drawer thought about the details out of the border of current main map. So, It sounds reasonable to me, too, having a mountain range in that direction but no need taking too much seriously, I guess. The river might run towards the south right out of the border of the map, there might not be a big mountain in that direction, or just pouring into a lake with no exit, and so on. well, we can make anything reasonable when we need it and can think about it later.

The reason why Fort Tahn is off the river bank might be...
1. It was more important to watch southern border or forest laying south than watching the river. If you follow my assumption I wrote yesterday, there was not much of traffic crossing the river.
2. There is some good place to defend itself or something good for the purpose at that location. For example if there is a small hill in a plain, it would be a good location to build a watch tower to look further.
3. Around and along the river bank might not be suitable for a settlement, like swampy low land.
4. or, just simply that was where the border of forest used to be. Humans wanted to claim as far as possible.

I don't know. Does any of them satisfy you?
Whatever the reason is, I guess they have some gate or something at the river bank to correct money from people trying to cross the river (I don't know what it is called in english, check point?), because that is the best location to check how many people comes in to and goes out from the south side of the river. I guess that satisfies the description in the manual.

Thanks,

[Deusite]

The fort I was talking about was in the wrong place, as it turns out. I was referring to the one that is now where 8e occurs.

I won't move the river fort where Sir Gerrick appears because the path leading to it is in the main map so the path would lead to nowhere if I put the fort closer to the river's source. However, I need to find space up there and and around the vale and black river because the labels simply won't fit in those spaces in some languages. Der schwarzen Fluss is not going to fit over where it says 'Black River' . I'm open for renames for the 'Kerlath Hills, 'Heart River' and the Kerlath river. Names aren't given for them, there just there as filler at the moment.

I've moved where scenario 3 takes place because it means redrawing bits of the Aethenwood that appear in the main map. It also states in the campaign that they're in the eastern border of the Aethenwood, and it makes much more sense for the elves to live north and south of the Aethen river than not.

Whatever the reason is, I guess they have some gate or something at the river bank to correct money from people trying to cross the river (I don't know what it is called in english, check point?)

toll gate.

The fort having a high vantage point and/or swampy land sounds good to me.

Prettier map, with an ultra high visibility font!

[TKS-2009ce]

Hi,

The location where scenario 3 takes place is fine to me. As a matter of fact, that location was one of the candidate of mine, but I wasn't sure if it was fair to say that the forest lying south of the River Aethen was also Aethenwoods. Therefore, I chose the one in the north but also in the same time, I felt it was too north and too far from the Vale. So, that location is fine to me, if nobody would be against to call that part of forest as Aethenwoods too.

Fort near 8e and locations for 6e, 6b, and 8e
I feel, having a fort at that far south is bit uncomfortable. The locations where 6e, 6b, and 8e take place are basically the same as in my messy sketch. So, I think it was me who made a mistake, but anyway, I think those labels should be on the north of "Heart River".
In scenario 8e (Return to Kerlath), it starts at the north bank of some watery area. You can see a bridge behind the starting camp. I think, that is "Heart River", and the river at the north end of the scenario map in 8e and 6b (Long March) is the tributary of "R. Kerlath", on which 7b is labeled now. Also, I think that the fort at the north end of 8e map is the one standing on that tributary (west of label 7b).
6e (Tiding, good and ill) should also start from the north of "Heart River", because there is no river running E-W in the scenario map, probably the starting point is somewhere left or above of letter H of the label "Heart river" in your map.
What do you think about it?

Whatever the reason is, I guess they have some gate or something at the river bank to correct money from people trying to cross the river (I don't know what it is called in english, check point?)

toll gate.

Ah, Ok. Thanks. I got an image of the one on Highway. So, it makes me feel bit weird, but it's fine. By the way, I just got a word, "Border control gate" in my mind right now. Is that same?

Thanks,

[Jetrel]

Ah, Ok. Thanks. I got an image of the one on Highway. So, it makes me feel bit weird, but it's fine. By the way, I just got a word, "Border control gate" in my mind right now. Is that same?

Thanks,

"Toll booth" is the term, but that's rather modern sounding.

[solsword]

I'm open for renames for the 'Kerlath Hills, 'Heart River' and the Kerlath river. Names aren't given for them, there just there as filler at the moment.

Can I get the Kerlath river named the River Alavynne (all the way up to where it meets the River Aethen)? Also, can I use this map when you're done with it?

I'm working on a campaign that needs a River Alavynne, and I just noticed this thread. When I started the campaign, I thought that the region along the coast south of the mouth of the river Aethen was uncharted, which gave me free reign to make things up. I proceeded to make the River Alavynne flow into the River Aethen just south of the main map, and place a city at the mouth of the River Aethen (but only during the golden age of Wesnoth...). But now I see that there are some fixed features from TSG, and I'd like to make my campaign compatible if possible. Since you said the name of the Kerlath river is up for grabs, and I need a river in that exact spot called the Alavynne, hopefully a simple re-name works perfectly. For the curious, the R. Alavynne is mentioned in the Mermaid Diviner description, but not placed yet on any map (as far as I've been able to tell).