As I’m starting to understand my world building fully of NPCs and lore and myths and monsters, I knew I would want to have a world map for my players (and myself) to reference. Its so helpful when needing to know where we are in relation to other parts of the world and figuring out the logistics of getting to and from there.
For example, I love it when authors add maps of their worlds. It never ceases to amaze me just how often I reference those seemingly hand drawn maps in the front cover when any character is referring to their home country or town. I love being able to look at where that is in relation to where they are now and where they are heading. I find it to be invaluable when getting immersed into the story.
Even as playing in a D&D campaign, I get so lost on where things are and where we are going when we don’t even have a simple map to reference. So, I definitely knew that I wanted to have one as well for my players.
I started off by trying to figure out what I was hoping for in a map. Did I want a simple hand-drawn world map on a piece of blank paper? Did I want regions and towns to be identifiable? Did I want details such as rivers, lakes and roads?
And then, I thought about how I was going to come up with names for all of these locations. While I was prepared to sit down and flip thru name generators and hand write in all of the locations possible, I really did not want to have to do that all on my own.
I decided that I wanted to have a world map that I could have created and I would then tweak it to make it unique for MY world. I did some research and found a couple of options online that would help me get started.
One of the most popular ones I found was Inkarnate. The interface was simple enough and it definitely provides a lot of resources for those who are just looking to have something simple and who want something completely customized to their liking. It also provides a TON of resources for those serious map makers who are looking to have town maps and dungeon maps and everything in between.
The only downside (from my perspective) is that the more in-depth options where only available with their paid service. I was trying to avoid having to pay just to make a map for one campaign.
I started looking around for possible alternatives and found one that I’m loving, Azgaar’s Fantasy Map Generator. It does take a bit to learn the basics but it’s quite versatile. I can include everything from terrain markers to town. There is also the option of setting the cultures and races that exist as well as assigning different governments and states. There is also a ton of functionality for making your own map from scratch or using a pre-generated one based on the type of world you’re trying to create.
Oh and if you want to make one culture smaller than another, you can edit the map based on smaller tracts of land. It will generate name of anything you might need in your map based on a database of names from a particular language such as German, Finnish, Elven, etc. If those don’t fit your needs, you can change them. I changed much of mine to have English origins, just to make them easier for myself and my players to pronounce.
When you first open up the page for the generator, you are greeted with a randomly created map, complete with regions, states and names for different cultures and governments.
The only sign of there being more to come is in the upper left hand corner. Here is where the world of possibility opens itself up to you. A little arrow that opens up into a menu of Layers, Styles, Options, Tools and About info.
This is where the magic happens. Here is where you can change the number of cultures, the number of states, add terrain relief to the map, show borders and create rivers, you can even show the temperature variations from one area to the next. You can create and manage routes and roads for your characters and players to us. Can modify the terrain by adding more mountains and lakes if you wish.
The possibilities are endless and I highly recommend this resource for anyone who wants to quickly and easily set up a map for an adventure, novel or anything else you desire.
Come with me as I work on building my DM journal with all the resources and knowledge and world-building lore that I’ll need as I prepare for my first campaign as a DM. You can follow me on Instagram and get updates as they become available. Also, don’t forget to follow this blog to see my update next week on taking my map and making it into smaller regional maps!