Critique my setting map?

[Totema]

I followed some terrific tutorials on the Cartographers' Guild site (and used some of my own GIMP expertise) to make a map for my custom D&D setting the other day.

Link because I don't want to ruin peoples' bandwidth

I think I did a lovely job; there are a few logistic issues I'd like to sort out before I use it for my "definitive" setting map, but in general I'm happy with it. Let me know what you guys think, I hope to get suggestions and questions that inspire me to refine my setting even more!

[avr]

Does the Elven Federation have some magic making it green while Tumunzar is apparently a desert?

Also - how monocultural are these regions? You've named most by races.

[Totema]

At the point in my setting's development all I can say about the regional climate is: it could be magic? I was using a lot of top-down thinking when I made the map, honestly. That's a good thing to consider down the road.

The four main nations (the ones with the big names) are dominated by particular races (humans in Baietours, dwarves in Tumunzar, non-drow elves in the Elven Federation, and drow in the Drow Lands) but are not completely monocultural. Baietours is mainly a feudal society with numerous semi-independent fiefdoms but is also home to assorted barbarians to the north and goblins to the southeast. Tumunzar is a dwarven kingdom that allied itself with the halfling clans, and though they are mostly concentrated in the central mountains there are numerous small mining settlements in the northern desert. The Elven Federation encompasses three distinct elven cultures. Gnomes live in the southern Federation and the northern Drow Lands, and orcs are found in patchwork tribes along the border between Baietours and Tumunzar.

[darklink_shadow]

It's a beautiful work of art. Clearly the entire elven side must be affected by magic, though. Along the same hemisphere as desert, forests do not usually exist.

My question is, perhaps you can slide the elven isle down so the forests of each and along the same lines? So often we see two islands just as you have yours, but is that realistic?

This would put the dwarves at the equator and the drow near a much colder climate.

[Avaris]

I'm not sure you need to shift the island down, and don't think you want to given the clear fit between the two land masses. Rather, I'd change the compass orientation. I think you want the N-S line to be roughly on the current NW-SE line. That way you have desert at one end, cold drow lands at the other, and temperate forest etc in the middle.

What's the river running through Baietours called? It's worth noting that it is equivilant in length to the Nile or Amazon! With all its tributaries I'd estimate 6000km or so... This is the key feature for me, and it seems odd that 2 of the 4 major cities, including the capital, are nowhere near it. With no coastline nearby, transporting goods around will be difficult, so the river is key. I quite like having goblin tribes downriver, so reaching the sea is difficult, and contact between the Elves and the humans rare.

i wonder if the Elvish federation wants to be split into a few large islands? And maybe an inland sea for Tumunzar, just to break up the vast desert? Could be a high salt sea, like the dead sea if you want.

[Eldan]

It could also work if this isn't a global map, but just one area of the world. The prevailing winds would have to be from the East. They would rain out over the Elven lands, leaving nothing for Tumunzar. Leaves a bit of a problem in Baietours, so maybe give either the eastern side of Tumunzar or the western side of the Elven federation some coastal mountains?

[horngeek]

It could also work if this isn't a global map, but just one area of the world. The prevailing winds would have to be from the East. They would rain out over the Elven lands, leaving nothing for Tumunzar. Leaves a bit of a problem in Baietours, so maybe give either the eastern side of Tumunzar or the western side of the Elven federation some coastal mountains?

If it's supposed to be a global map, I assign it no points for a complete lack of sense of scale.

I do like that the humans aren't completely dominant, but only four nations seems... a bit low.

[Totema]

After giving it a while for some creative distance, I can tell that the scale is totally way too large. I didn't intend for this to be the entire world; it is supposed to be one region. I tried to scale it so that the western continent is somewhere between the size of Greenland and the continental US, but I guess I wasn't so great at the math there. Can anyone lend a hand on fixing that?

I do completely intend to give the four nations a lot of granularity in their culture, but I'm still working on that.

Update: In light of even more rumination on my setting, I've decided to completely revise the map from the ground up. I'll make a new post with the link when I'm done and happy with it.