AOS: Orient Express 1883 [quench'd]

[ender516]

You might find the Land Bonus card fit better if you tilted the other way, but it might require swapping the "Land Monopoly" and "Hold all land territories of a country for:" elements.

[natty dread]

You might find the Land Bonus card fit better if you tilted the other way

If you excuse me, I will go cry myself to sleep now.

[RedBaron0]

LOL, I know the feeling well.

I remember that discussion, the on thing about the legend that bothers me on the bottom is the train. One of the most distinctive things about a stream engine is the stack, and the train you have here has the stack up under France. If you can arrange it so the stack can be seen, that'd be great!

[natty dread]

the on thing about the legend that bothers me on the bottom is the train. One of the most distinctive things about a stream engine is the stack, and the train you have here has the stack up under France. If you can arrange it so the stack can be seen, that'd be great!

I will try.

[natty dread]

v21 update

[bigimg]http://a.imageshack.us/img90/9611/orientxv21b.png[/bigimg]




I think this legend is the best so far.

[porkenbeans]

The white text on Schleswig, Belgium, Netherlands, Corsica, and Sardinia, should be made to match the rest. Also while I'm on the text, The train stations are a different font from the other territs, this is good, but I would take it a step further, and make them a different color as well.

[natty dread]

The white text on Schleswig, Belgium, Netherlands, Corsica, and Sardinia, should be made to match the rest.

The white text was done because black text was hard to read on the ocean, with the font of the land territories. People complained about it so I made them white. I can try making them black again, but if people complain again I'll have to change them back...

Also while I'm on the text, The train stations are a different font from the other territs, this is good, but I would take it a step further, and make them a different color as well.

You already suggested this before. Frankly I don't think this is a good idea - the land area is light so black text is the best in terms of legibility. They are already quite distinguishable from the land territories by having a different font and higher contrast.

Plus I don't think colourful text would really fit this map. It is fine for a futuristic map like Lunar War, but this is supposed to look like 19th century, and when people think of 19th century they usually think tones of sepia or black and white...

[natty dread]

This is how the large version looks with the white text changed back to black:

[bigimg]http://a.imageshack.us/img682/3306/orientxv21bbt.png[/bigimg]

[The Bison King]

yeah... I think the white text worked better.

[The Bison King]

I think the land monopoly legend should be a little less tilted.

[porkenbeans]

You can play with the outside glow on that text. Maybe make the size larger and decrease the opacity so that it is less noticeable.

About the different color for the stations, I do not recommend anything striking, just a litle somethin-somethin to give it a slight contrast from the other. Maybe a rusty red tint on the territs, and leave the stations as they are.

[the.killing.44]

Italicize the station names.

[ender516]

Pork has a point about the glow: "Amsterdam" seems to have a brighter glow than the other text on the seas, and it is a little easier to read. That being said, I had no problem with the white text.

[The Bison King]

...I know you're going to hate me for saying this but I think the orientation of the Land Monopoly card looked better the first way you had it. It drew the eye into the image rather than how it is now where it leads your focus of attention out of the image.

[ghirrindin]

It's the whole thing as it's put together. The elements are 19th century, but are just arranged in such a way that just does not convey that, at least for me. The way it is, it's just a MAP.

That new legend, in that orientation, would be a vast improvement. I get a sense of someone, traveling, holding their map seeing where they're going, with a ticket laying on top of their map.

Or maybe even better, Just make the map a ticket. Something along these lines.
[bigimg]http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv12/porkenbeans/orientxv17copy2.png[/bigimg] Besides not only looking unique from every other CC map, It allows you to drop the play area down closer to the action buttons.

Well hold on here. Throwing away the ticket is your prerogative as the mapmaker, but there's something to be said for adding colors to the regions. Your map lacks the warmth of the contemporary print culture, which is essential if you want to convey the luxury and opulence commonly associated with the OE. I'd also suggest changing the color of the oceans so they don't look forbidding, cold, and murky. You went off on that really bizarre tangent about a time-traveling train-mogul and if that's truly the direction you want to take the map, wouldn't the train-mogul want to make the map, brochure, or whatever it is you have here attractive to potential investors and riders? Think of the train-mogul..

[The Bison King]

It's the whole thing as it's put together. The elements are 19th century, but are just arranged in such a way that just does not convey that, at least for me. The way it is, it's just a MAP.

That new legend, in that orientation, would be a vast improvement. I get a sense of someone, traveling, holding their map seeing where they're going, with a ticket laying on top of their map.

Or maybe even better, Just make the map a ticket. Something along these lines.
[bigimg]http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv12/porkenbeans/orientxv17copy2.png[/bigimg] Besides not only looking unique from every other CC map, It allows you to drop the play area down closer to the action buttons.

Well hold on here. Throwing away the ticket is your prerogative as the mapmaker, but there's something to be said for adding colors to the regions. Your map lacks the warmth of the contemporary print culture, which is essential if you want to convey the luxury and opulence commonly associated with the OE. I'd also suggest changing the color of the oceans so they don't look forbidding, cold, and murky. You went off on that really bizarre tangent about a time-traveling train-mogul and if that's truly the direction you want to take the map, wouldn't the train-mogul want to make the map, brochure, or whatever it is you have here attractive to potential investors and riders? Think of the train-mogul..

Disagreed. When I look at this map the last thing I think is that it needs to be more colorful.

[natty dread]

Various text styles



Land Territory labels that are on sea:
Belgium: same as the inland territories, black text
Schleswig: the old white text
Netherlands: black text, with a stronger glow

Station labels:
Amsterdam: current station text
Berlin: italic station text
Paris: rusty station text

I'm just a bit worried about the italic text, it may not work too well for the small version.

[The Bison King]

Schleswig, or Amsterdam

[porkenbeans]

It's the whole thing as it's put together. The elements are 19th century, but are just arranged in such a way that just does not convey that, at least for me. The way it is, it's just a MAP.

That new legend, in that orientation, would be a vast improvement. I get a sense of someone, traveling, holding their map seeing where they're going, with a ticket laying on top of their map.

Or maybe even better, Just make the map a ticket. Something along these lines.
[bigimg]http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv12/porkenbeans/orientxv17copy2.png[/bigimg] Besides not only looking unique from every other CC map, It allows you to drop the play area down closer to the action buttons.

Well hold on here. Throwing away the ticket is your prerogative as the mapmaker, but there's something to be said for adding colors to the regions. Your map lacks the warmth of the contemporary print culture, which is essential if you want to convey the luxury and opulence commonly associated with the OE. I'd also suggest changing the color of the oceans so they don't look forbidding, cold, and murky. You went off on that really bizarre tangent about a time-traveling train-mogul and if that's truly the direction you want to take the map, wouldn't the train-mogul want to make the map, brochure, or whatever it is you have here attractive to potential investors and riders? Think of the train-mogul..

Disagreed. When I look at this map the last thing I think is that it needs to be more colorful.

Yes I did add color, but I also hue'd out everything, so as to tone down the vividness and brightness of the map. The problem as I see it is, the colors are too fresh and bright. Colorful is cool, and to the period. But you need to hue the tone down, to what that poster has. Also the white on the map should be yellowed to something like the poster.

[porkenbeans]

[bigimg]http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv12/porkenbeans/test1111111111111.png[/bigimg]The top Schleswig is the same as the bottom one, but has the opacity turned all of the way up, to show how I disguise the glow. The one to the left has no glow. The procedure is to widen out the size and pump up the spread to around 70 or 80. Then just turn down the opacity till you are happy.

[natty dread]

Schleswig, or Amsterdam

No "or", there's 2 kinds of labels needed here...

Also, I seem to have missed some posts...

Well hold on here. Throwing away the ticket is your prerogative as the mapmaker, but there's something to be said for adding colors to the regions. Your map lacks the warmth of the contemporary print culture, which is essential if you want to convey the luxury and opulence commonly associated with the OE.

I appreciate your feedback but disagree entirely. Adding colour like was done in pork's suggestion would ruin the map. Take a look at some 19th century maps, they generally have colours used very sparingly.

Also, for everyone who keeps mentioning the OE theme and the associations within it, I would remind that the map is also part of a larger thematic entity, which is the Age of Steam map pack. I want the maps in the pack to be somewhat consistent in style, so I cannot go overboard with the OE theme in this map; rather, I wish to stick to the more general 19th century rail theme.

...I know you're going to hate me for saying this but I think the orientation of the Land Monopoly card looked better the first way you had it. It drew the eye into the image rather than how it is now where it leads your focus of attention out of the image.

I'm not going to hate you - in fact I sort of agree with you, but the counter-clockwise tilted one works better in terms of clarity and space constraints - to put it in simple terms, it fits the map better. So I think I will be going with that one - I might change my mind later on but for now I'm going with it.

Now, back to deciding on the territory labels...

[natty dread]

Ah, more posts while I was posting that last one...

Yes I did add color, but I also hue'd out everything, so as to tone down the vividness and brightness of the map. The problem as I see it is, the colors are too fresh and bright. Colorful is cool, and to the period. But you need to hue the tone down, to what that poster has.

Go check the foundry guidelines - function before form. In this case, the colours cannot be faded down, they are needed to identify the bonus areas - think colourblind issues.

And BTW pork, please stop digging up ancient versions and commenting on them. If you want to give feedback, please direct it towards the latest version. The colours of the latest version are not nearly as bright as the ones you were commenting on.

The top Schleswig is the same as the bottom one, but has the opacity turned all of the way up, to show how I disguise the glow. The one to the left has no glow. The procedure is to widen out the size and pump up the spread to around 70 or 80. Then just turn down the opacity till you are happy.

ok pork wtf is that thing on the schleswig label? Please don't rape my map

For a reminder, here's my options for the territory labels again (as it seems you may have missed them):

[porkenbeans]

I just used the map that I had, to show you how to do the outerglow on the text.
OOOps, almost forgot. When you do the glow, make it with a blue tint instead of yellow. Very important to achieve the effect over a blue back.

[natty dread]

OOOps, almost forgot. When you do the glow, make it with a blue tint instead of yellow. Very important to achieve the effect over a blue back.

the glow has no tint, it's white...


edit: and still, if it's not too much to ask, please don't post even modified versions of old versions of my map. If you must show your ideas through modified images, please use the latest version for them, it helps keep us all on the same page.

[RedBaron0]

Text is probably fine as it, I do like the italicize look, maybe go a point or 2 bigger?