Mapping software

[MNBlockHead]

Originally Posted by Dark Lord Galen

Thanks Gloranphile good tip had not noticed that.... I see MNBlockhead already found it!

I have to say, though, that the Reddit forum for Inkwell ideas is pretty dead. Lots of good questions from users met with the sound of crickets. This may be in part because it is such new software that all users are new and there is not yet a large enough body of experience users to share knowledge. This makes it that much more important for the developers to become engaged.

Really makes me appreciate LWD's forums.

[gloranphile]

Originally Posted by MNBlockHead

I have to say, though, that the Reddit forum for Inkwell ideas is pretty dead.

I've noticed that lately as well. I think the mod (I believe the owner of Inkwell) was great at first, but it's slacked quite a bit.

[MNBlockHead]

Originally Posted by gloranphile

I've noticed that lately as well. I think the mod (I believe the owner of Inkwell) was great at first, but it's slacked quite a bit.

The Reddit forum is pretty dead. The support material is lacking. Also, I'm finding Cityographer to be not only poorly supported but just not stable. I'm having it hang on a 250 population village with fewer roads than I have fingers. I can manipulate huge and complicated maps in Campaign Cartographer without issues. My initial enthusiasm for Cityographer has quickly sunk to buyer's remorse and I would caution anyone to sink money into it until it becomes more stable and when it is clear that there is real support behind it.

I'm still really hoping to get it to work for me, however, because the concept is great. It would be an incredible aid for generating the hundreds or even thousands of villages dotting a realm.

[Dark Lord Galen]

Originally Posted by MNBlockHead

The Reddit forum is pretty dead. The support material is lacking.
I'm still really hoping to get it to work for me, however, because the concept is great. It would be an incredible aid for generating the hundreds or even thousands of villages dotting a realm.

Agree on the Owner response till I managed to dig up his personal email. That made it marginally better. It seems to be (And no insult to LWD in particular) a collective problem with smaller companies being understaffed to deal with customer direct issues. I have dealings with several and would categorize companies by various factors. Customer Trouble shooting, Customer question response, Meeting Deliverables, etc.
Inkwell is in the top 5 of the list (as it relates to failed customer response) with D20pro & LWD somewhere in the middle. Again, it's probably related to available staff / time constraints. Just the nature of the industry at the time.

D20 Pro & LW have a lot in common when it comes to this comparison. Both are better than average at customer trouble shooting and LW leads question reply and both have trouble defining true deliverable timing. Inkwell is almost the reverse.

Reaper (a Texas company by the way) & Chessex are IMO some of the best, but again, both are quite abit larger than the ones mentioned above. Certainly Hazbro/WOC is one of the collective worst. So there is a point where the company can be too small to fit its needs (as is the case for LWD) and conversely (in WOC) can be so large they don't care.

Originally Posted by MNBlockHead

Also, I'm finding Cityographer to be not only poorly supported but just not stable. I'm having it hang on a 250 population village with fewer roads than I have fingers..................My initial enthusiasm for Cityographer has quickly sunk to buyer's remorse and I would caution anyone to sink money into it until it becomes more stable and when it is clear that there is real support behind it.

Humm, curious, I have not experienced any of that... my complaints are more along the short comings,

• Compress building density in large cities
• a more usable export system for the various building random populating
• the ability to tell it what type of village I want.. ie maybe I don't want a human village, I want an orc one (the populations can be percentaged, but the buildings themselves cant)

I've never experienced a hang problem. maybe the assigned ram?
Im no Inkwell tech, lol

just my 2cp
DLG

[Dark Lord Galen]

Originally Posted by Parody

Which I didn't know, so I went poking around to see what it was you were distributing.

I don't know if I'd choose the word "distribute", but to each his own.. I was simply asked where it could be found and discovered they took a trip to mercury I guess. [/quote]

For myself, distribute is suggesting I have more involvement (ie I profit from it, provide tech support, etc) than I am providing. So for any, the link provided, as stated before, is for your own convenience I have no affiliation nor desire to be a representative for Shardgames.

Originally Posted by Parody

Which, to me, is an extremely poor design decision. Saving to protect yourself from being interrupted in your work, wanting to back up your work in an editable form, and such are primary concerns for creative applications.

It's unfortunate that they didn't put more emphasis on this feature, but it's too late now.

I don't disagree, but it was not considered a "Rarity" for sidebar programmers to leave off chunks either thru no desire to complete, a beta version, etc, as you suggested earlier.. And yea it's a shame, and a mute point at this juncture. But for all its warts, it is a very easy / cheap one shot use.

Originally Posted by Parody

Saving in a native file format (which is what I've been talking about) is not new tech. The version of the app you're redistributing was released in 2007. I have painting programs from the 80s (in my case, on the Commodore 64) that can save their graphics so you can load and edit them again later.

I get what you were implying, and think we are both saying t he same thing from opposite sides of the same fence. As to the program, It was available as early as 2003.

As to comparing "old programs" there is no fruit to gain there other than to prove we are both gurnards. Because like you, I have a Commodore 64, TI99-4A and had owned a "trash80". So your not the only collector of archaic software that "We" still employ.

Originally Posted by Parody

Hopefully this explains where I was coming from. Sorry I wandered so far off-topic.

And like you state above, to you and the community didn't mean to wander off..

To steer us back to the topic,
Another good 3d wireframe type is World Machine. Its approach is quite different and the learning curve is HIGH but it produces great outdoor maps to use as a baseline for adding other clipart and getting a pro result.

Just my 2cp
DLG

http://www.world-machine.com/download.php

[MNBlockHead]

I've never experienced a hang problem. maybe the assigned ram?
Im no Inkwell tech, lol

I turned out to be an issue with just one map. I'm not sure what happened, but I just started over and have not had an issue.

[Madmaxneo]

All those mentioned are great programs. CC3 is probably the most versatile in the fact that it has so many add ons and there is so much you can do with it. Unfortunately it is expensive and if you want to take advantage of all it has to offer then it gets extremely expensive. There is a learning curve for just about any mapping program out there. But the easiest for me to learn was Dundjinni and it is a great program with many free add ons. I have used it to put maps on my TV along with a fog of war overlay so that the players could only see what their characters could see. If you have any graphics program experience then I would recommend Xara photo and graphic designer. I have used that to re-draw some maps of poor quality then use those maps in Maptools (or now Mote) to great effect. Even if you don't have any graphics programming experience it is much easier to learn than the other programs and there are literally terabytes of textures and images you can use to create any kind of map. Not to forget the loads of help you can get from forums like the Cartographers Guild, or the Xara graphics forums which not only has people willing to help you learn how to use the program but have loads of free maps. BTW, if your patient you can usually catch Xara Photo and Graphic designer 10 for around $39 and it usually gets to about half that during the holidays at the end of the year. I have developed a couple of maps in Xara but I haven't worked on any maps in awhile but that is going to change now that I will be using Realm Works for my current campaign.

[Alarian]

While I used to use Campaign Cartographer quite a bit and have pretty much everything profantasy has ever produced, I have not reinvested in the latest version (3) and most likely won't.

I'm surprised it hasn't been mentioned yet, but for the past few years I've been pretty much exclusively using google to find maps and such that have been done by others and using them in my game. There is so much stuff out there that's as good or better than I can do that's already available to use for free. Tons of modules have web versions done already that I can just import into MapTool (my VTT of choice) and it saves me so much time. It would be extremely rare that I would create an encounter that must look "exactly like this". I just look through my already gathered collection first looking for something I think might work and if that fails, head onto google and do a bit of foo magic. There are tons and tons of villages, cities, dungeons, wilderness encounter sites, ruins you name it that I feel like I'm better off now days using my time to work on the encounters and use some of the stuff others have done.

[Madmaxneo]

Yes there are loads of free images online. So much so that one would never have to create their own content and still have somewhat of an original world. I have downloaded many many maps over the course of the last few years. But I also want to create my own maps and re-do some in the world I am using (Mithra for HARP). Once you learn a program it can be very fun to layout an entire world, city, or dungeon of your own design. Programs like CC3, Dundjinni, Inkwell, Xara, and loads of others are for those that have a specific vision and would like to see it laid for all to see (or at least their players).

FYI, years ago they came out with the entire world of Forgotten Realms for CC2. I still have that program and it is very useful for those that still use that setting. It is a great product though I am not even sure if it is still available. That same functionality is available through Realm Works but it takes time to input all the links and what not. Now all they need is a global view with regular links instead of pins that can rotate.....

Bruce

[Paragon]

I make use of other's maps when possible, but often I have rather specific needs and just have to do it myself. Sometimes its also the case where the extent maps have grids that I don't want.