![1459742130823[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/FH7wUTQ.jpg "1459742130823[1].jpg")
>tfw this is every setting I've ever played
I kind of like it
>>46450222
No flying city means it's not Cliche enough.
Wow.
I'm gonna have to run a short campaign in this setting.
Encourage the players to roll up alcoholic gem-loving dwarven warriors and nature-inclined elven rangers and just try to be as generic as possible.
>>46450222
There's nothing with being generic. The worst it can is to be predictable. Trying to be unique most of the time always fails.
>>46450283
Well I guess somewhere off the map there could be "The Floating Continent - Where high level monsters dwell after you've beaten the main quest"
>>46450331
Then right at the final confrontation, go full genre whiplash and have something completely out of the ordinary happen, like the villain reveal to the heroes that the capital has already been razed to ground thirty-five minutes prior
>>46450222
>even here, Blackwater is present
Fucking Blackwater, killing muh quests. Fugging muh dice.
>>46450222
>>46450331
>>46450560
I'm doing this
>>46450222
>It's a cliche
>That means it's immediatly and irrevocably bad
>>46450710
I would love to play a campaign like that. All my characters are generic as can be anyway!
>>46450710
Ditto. I was going to run a one shot soon anyway and I couldn't decide what to do
>>46450560
wouldn't full whiplash be like the villain is a 10 year old boy who wished he was Big, and the Zoltar machine took "Bad Evil Guy" to be implied?
>>46450222
One thing I would like to do one day is have a pseudo-European setting in which the pale-skinned primitives of Nordia eek out a living in their frigid wilds while the swarthy Surmen raiders sack the southern coast in search of booty.
>>46450222
As long as you play it in a way that's interesting, cliches can be fun. Good characters can make a well-worn story feel new again, plopping some interesting races/political stuff on that cliched map can make it shine. Even if you just say 'this is going to be like Arthur and his Knights,' players can enjoy working within a comfy and well loved cliche that's a little different from what has become overly common.
But whatever you do, don't try to break those cliches in stupid ways without thinking how the whole comes together and without leaving anything familiar for the players to work with, and don't play it as another TES 'it's cliche on the surface but it's actually really deep!' Elder Scrolls pulled it off, but you can't shove the deep lore into the game without exposition and making the world feel cheap.
>13th Age default map
>your backgrounds fill in the blanks
>No, its totally unique!
>>46450710
virgin_armor.jpg
I kind of prefer this map.
>>46451637
Oh come now, that is obviously the world minus the Americas. Even Warhammer barely got away with that. You could at least put everything in different places.
>>46450222
What if you started your campaign in gothmor?
>>46451723
Then you are too-edgy weeb shits.
>>46450222
>try to make unique setting
>it more or less ends up like that
>>46450222
https://youtu.be/c2EJMd7ZN7w
I wanna play in this weird-ass setting : (
>>46451735
You don't have to be bad guys, just unlucky people who live in or are residing in an evil shithole and where is the weeb bit coming from?
Part of being an adult and not the comic book guy from the Simpsons is accepting that cliches don't automatically make something bad.
>>46450222
>tfw
>>46451695
>>46451637
More like Golarion.
>>46451637
Isn't that literally just the map from Pathfinder?
>>46450222
Give us a better one then
>>46451763
Hey, watch it! Just because it's got a name like Gothmor and the soil is black and we have the Dark Tower with the Ever Watching Presence doesn't mean this is an evil shithole!
I mean, maybe sort of ruthless, maybe a little cruel, but not straight up evil.
I'll have you know we have a flourishing glass blowing industry! And the tectonic instability have really made mining very easy.
True, our agriculture suffers, but we substitute our diets with fish and imported foods.
We, the Gothmorians, are a pround and happy people, damn it!
>>46450222
I actually would really like a campaign in this setting.
>>46450222
>unique experiences in a cool place are impossible because someone came up with the location before
>im a giant special snowflake faggot
lets see you come up with something better
>>46450222
WAIT JUST A FUCKING MINUTE
>>46452534
>UK is "the exotic city"
>>46452558
Y'got enough fuckin paki's there yeah I think it counts
And look. WORLD SCAR. They just up and put the Channel in there too, motherfuckers
>>46452526
REEEEEE! STOP BEING CORRECT!
>>46451637
>Ravenholm
MY
ICING
>>46450710
Use the blurb. Literally every PC is a Chosen One.
>>46452534
>Bandit city
>north
JESUS FUCK
>>46452618
uuuuuuUUUUUuuuuu
>>46450222
I was considering running a game in Clichea where the characters get mechanical bonuses for falling into character roles.
One of the villains would be a former hero who trained all of his life to fulfill a heroic prophesy and avenge his mother's death- only to find out that he wasn't the destined, and would never be due to the nature of the prophesy.
He lashes out in anger, believing that he might be able to change fate by opposing the chosen heroes, and his father would be a major character and help the PCs, though they wouldn't know until it was explicitly explained.
>>46450283
Technically flying cities are surprisingly rare in traditional fantasy setting. They're more of a modern fantasy thing just like guns and magitech.
Also, OP's map is pretty inaccurate even when compared to traditional fantasy, but it has right idea.
>>46451637
Now this is actually so correct it's scary
>>46452675
The map kind of reminds me of the Belgariad.
>>46451637
Hey, you have to move pieces around to make it Muh Setting.
>>46452558
>Londonistan
>Northwards, you have Not-Glasgow, home of the stabby bandits
Seems legit
>>46452633
>Vikingheim
>Greek
>>46452733
Varingian Guard.
>>46452633
>Germany is the village of unlikely heroes
LITERALLY NOTHING WRONG
>>46452836
You could argue it's more Denmark or Poland.
>>46452733
They're literally the same.
>believe the Gods have preordained all their fuckups, so why not
>prone to dancing like lunatics after getting sloshed as fuck
>go charging around a shallow sea with long, shallow-draft ships designed for teams of rowers
>Shield wall? Shield wall.
>Coastal terror raids from ships? Athens called!
>WE ARE AWAITED IN VALHALLA? Sparta called!
>Constantly fucking up/raiding a bunch of pussies across the Adriatic Sea/English Channel? Check.
>Eventually get BTFO when said pussies harden up into big lads? Check.
>Constantly fighting to the death with neighbors whom you hold to be total cunts, but everyone else thinks you both look just as brown/just as pasty white? Check.
SEA NIGGERS ARE SEA NIGGERS. ALL THE SAME
>>46452618
Em pleh!
>>46452633
>>46452534
>>46453122
>ARABIAN NIII-IIIGHTS
>HERE BE ELVES
>it fits
>>46453122
I was looking at this reading the bit about the jagged coastline thinking 'well I guess they could be fjords?' and then after a few moments more I realized it was a sideways Europe.
>>46453223
>sideways
Fun fact: Old European maps had the East at the top. It's why Orient means both 'the East' and 'to align something correctly'.
>>46453223
It took the boot to tip me off
>>46453169
Middle-Earth (and Tolkien-derived works by extension) was based on a mythical Europe, so the fact it works in reverse is hardly surprising.
>>46453223
desu it's not exactly europe, France is fudged.
>>46453257
And the Black Sea has been messed with for no apparent reason.
>>46451637
>aztec serpents
People are still doing this?
>>46451735
>lawful good,not even one
>>46450560
I APPROVE
>>46452633
>managed to put Rhodesia in it.
10/10
Star Lake isn't even star-shaped!
>>46450222
I have never played a setting like that. I only see stuff like that in books
>>46450222
Nobody knows what a "Reach" actually is.
>>46450222
Well, there's not Not-Japan, Not-India, Not-Arabia, Not-Polynesia and Pirate Land, also called Not-Caribbean.
No massive sinkhole exposing a large, country sized area of the Underdark.
Also no Mushroom forest.
It's missing a few bits to be any of the fantasy worlds I've played in.
>>46453802
I star fell into it.
>>46453223
It was the crack about England that tipped me off.
>>46451637
My next character will hail from Suckmarsh.
>>46454075
Look at the second map. It literally has everything.
>>46451637
>elven illuminati
not generic enough
only setting I can think of where elves are literally illuminati that want to fuck up the world is TES
>>46454155
Reminds me of Assholia.
>>46454412
Still missing the country sized sinkhole to the underground kingdoms and mushroom forest.
But it does have all the expy countries.
>>46454730
They were fun threads
>>46450222
>azgard
>not assguard
>>46451637
I like to think that Tiger-Headed Opium Nightmare is caused by run off from the Mountains of Madness.
>>46450222
I would 100% play this if everyone at the table were forced to speak like BRIAN BLESSED.
>>46451637
This map is more complete than OP, but less well executed.
>>46454012
You're reaching at this very moment.
I really want to play in this setting.
The ironic thing is that it would be a breath of fresh air.
>>46458615
I think that many people feel we've hit a kind of saturation of deconstructive settings and just want a nice reconstructive one.
>>46450222
>that one river swerves away from the sea and towards mountains
what the fuck
>>46459138
Could be a tributary connected to a lake or something? Makes sense that a lake would form there.
>>46450222
This looks like it would be fun to play on.
>>46454012
You could say that's an example of one on the map, but I guess it's a bit ofa reach.
>map of the setting is a real island/country/continent flipped sideways
>>46450222
that is a lot more AsoIaF than I realized at first
>>46453122
I fucking love this image. It's every invalid criticism of every Fantasy map ever rolled up in one image.
>>46452380
Yes it is
>>46460085
it's bad at doing it though. The middle east isn't like mordor, the hungarian plain is. Look at the hungarian plain for god's sake. Then, who ever attacked a map for having an inland sea? And how is the 'Arabian Nights' critisism refuted, considering they rotated the map and spain isn't actually this extreme 'supersouthpoint'.
And the criticism for Russia? That must be made up for this image specifically.
>>46460429
also, what suggests that on the continent part of the scandinavian peninsula there are elves? how is that a criticism of that map?
fantasy maps are all tolkiennesque and tolkien was heavily inspired by real world literature/history/geography. of course the real world is going to be sort of present in anything that is based on lotr
>>46460456
"Tolkien's Elves and Dwarves are by and large based on Norse and related Germanic mythologies"
>>46460429
turkey is like mordor because it was the center of the ottoman empire, and the book is basically driving them out like what happened with world war I. the parallels are everywhere
also the evil land being the middle east is obviously the easterlings. after mordor is defeated, the easterlings are defeated by elessar.
>>46460505
>"Tolkien's Elves and Dwarves are by and large based on Norse and related Germanic mythologies"
well so how is it a criticism of THE MAP? Dwarfs and Elfs don't usually live up north and to the west specifically. I get why there are elfs there, because elfs are a typically norse thing, but if we're talking about how this map deconstructs invalid criticism of fantasy maps (and we are, that was the conversation we had), then I gotta say: that, among other things, is a strawman.
>>46460603
read the fucking conversation you're replying to, you're embarrassing yourself by completely misunderstanding the point of it
>>46460653
>>46460456
Finns were seen are spirit/monster/things by other scandinavian people during ledieval times.
>>46460692
Either I'm getting trolled here or you are unable to understand that sometimes you can talk about certain things in more than one aspect.
Either way I'm not going to explain it to you, peace oot.
>>46460653
valinor (home for immortals, including elves) is west of middle earth if you want to get technical.
the point I was making is that the lore source is correct (norse mythology actually had a belief that elves existed)
>>46460736
>>46460692 here.
It took me some time to understand why I got such an answer. But I finally get what you mean, and I agree.
>>46458382
IMPETUOUS BOY!
>>46453304
I'm doing Aztec cowboy lizardmen. Is that allowed?
>>46453122
I just noticed it was earth when i saw Italy
>get to Vikingheim
>it's actually occupied by Romans pretending to be Vikings
>get to Gothmor
>it's actually very naturally bright but the inhabitants make it dark with very large parasols
>Mount Death is an artificial volcano
Is this... some kind of tourist thing?
>>46461612
>entire continent is just an island off the coast of a real setting
>it's basically a theme park
>>46461636
I'm feeling uncomfortable. That tree is clearly just a large pile of wood. And I saw you painting my name on those stones of prophecy before I arrived.
>>46450365
>Trying to be unique most of the time always fails.
Or, or, here's another idea...
just start writing stuff down and not give 2 shits if its generic or unique, just what sounds fun or interesting to you. when you've got it to where you have something vaguely resembling a rough-draft going, and show it to some friends and see if they like it.
because that's all that matters, as long as it's fun, no one will care if its "original" or "generic".
>>46453223
The 'who designed this, an alien?' crack is great one you realize it actually is Norway and he's referencing Hitchhiker's Guide.
>>46461895
Some anon who said he created that image said he just made it to put that joke in. That being said, it's more or less the only thing worthwhile about it.
>>46462279
Then why is it the top post on Reddit?
>>46453223
took me all of 10 seconds to figure out what I was looking at.
Ya'll fuckers keep replying to this shit.
>>46461850
This is really important. Two settings can both be great and well done, but people will prefer one to the other based on their own ideas of what's fun or cool.
The thing that frustrates me is when so many of my ideas jar together. I want to somehow mix together Knights of the Round Table style classic fantasy, Dark Souls and its lonely atmosphere (for some spots), gothic-style vampires and some other stuff inspired from classic literature, what is basically the Maritime Silk Road but with moar pirates and an excuse for tons of exotic cultures, not!China, and vaguely Native American/Mongolian elves. Also magic statues, but enough technological progress for regular cannons made out of copper.
Basically at that point you have to ask, is it good to throw things together, or is it better to try to keep to what makes sense?
>>46462360
Why do you know that?
>>46462498
I followed the link in /wbg/.
Clichea is the second highest.
>>46462525
What the fuck is /wbg/?
>>46462485
>Basically at that point you have to ask, is it good to throw things together, or is it better to try to keep to what makes sense?
That's what I'm getting at, throw it all at the proverbial wall and see what sticks. If you can't get some element to make sense, you drop it altogether, or just the parts that make it not work.
>>46462593
It should be noted that there is nothing wrong with looking through history, folklore, and anthropology books not just for inspiration, but to see if there is any real-world incidents that might help make an element work.and don't just read stuff on medieval Europe and Japan, there are many cultures that can offer whole new avenues for ideas and inspiration,
>>46462525
Because redditors are retards and/or appreciate a good joke too.
>>46462498
some people use other websites too
it's not good to get all your opinions from one place you know, you gotta diversify your copying so you look like an individual
>>46462721
I'd like more weird monsters like the sasquatch or the Japanese folklore.
They have some really creepy monsters too.
>>46452688
To be fair, the Belgariad was literally written when Eddings saw Tolkien, said "This guy is still around? I can do the same thing!" and did it.
And while it's not a masterpiece, it definitely manages to hit that fantasy cliche sweet-spot that made it fun reading on a rainy Sunday afternoon.
>>46460429
>middle east
>evil hoards who want to conquer the world and destroy civilization
Arabia is slightly off the mark geographically, but It works more than you'd think.
>>46450365
If you're gonna create something as uninspired as this then you should use a published setting instead.
>>46463606
But I don't like those!
>>46463606
A published setting is usually fairly fleshed out, and maybe a GM will want to make their own details despite being fairly generic.
