Reply With QuoteCool idea!
The South Indies: Lemuria
Hello, fellow mapping enthusiasts!
After finishing a series of alternate-history world maps for a roleplaying game I've been writing for some time, I started working on the last three landmasses that are entirely fictional, collectively known as the South Indies ("Indias Meridionales"): Lemuria in the South Indian Ocean, Mu on the South Pacific, and Hiva in the Central Pacific.
I started with Lemuria: the idea was to have this vast continent that joined Australia with Antarctica (as was one of the prevailing theories in the XVIII and early XIX centuries), but keeping most of Australia in place, fusing it into the larger landmass.
The intense red here shows the fictional land, while the faded one has the real surface:
And then after adding some colour and coastlines:
While I'm trying to ignore some of the more egregious climatic issues having such a big chunk of extra land would imply for the world at large (no more El Niño!), I tried to aim for a bit of realness: Lemuria is slowly splitting in the middle, creating the vast region of craggy mountains and deep, elongated lakes, which have allowed vegetation to expand inland, in contrast with the hot northern deserts and the cold southern wastelands. This region is inhabited by a series of Aboriginal-inspired cultures, in a more sophisticated degree of organisation that is just beginning to come into contact with the outside world, as the European trading companies have begun marching inland.
To the west the continent breaks up into a couple of big islands and multiple smaller ones; this region is called Lesser Lemuria, and is inhabited by all manners of megafauna (ie, ridiculously big creatures). Here's where you go for your King Kong and Godzilla extravaganza. As a result, this region, while fertile, is sparsely populated by humans; most of the locals remain in island-states surrounding the bigger, more perilous isles, after having sailed hundreds of years ago from India. The Great Powers have found it extremely hard to make their way in (as getting eaten often does), so they have started to rely on the more knowledgeable locals to understand the region.
To the east extends Cook's Bay, which separates Greater Lemuria from Mu (which is further east and comes in the next map, hopefully). A fragmented Maori-inspired group of civilisations inhabits the region sandwiched between the sea and the suspiciously unnatural mountains that make it nigh impossible to access Inner Mu; the great trading companies have been playing these peoples against each other (in the manner of Cortés and the Mexican nations) in a bid to dominate the region, while the local leaders eagerly await assistance from the mighty kingdoms of Hiva, far to the north. But no ship nor emissary has been seen.
The south is an unknown wasteland, growing colder and colder until the imposing glaciers of Antarctica cut far into the sky. Tales of mysterious civilisations and strange, oversized humans abound; there are legends of a Chinese fleet oddly trapped in the ice somehow, and of mad geniuses conducting their superscientific witchcraft in these trackless expanses.
Now working on distributing the territories among the various local and foreign nations, and naming stuff.
Last edited by Klaus van der Kroft; 02-05-2020 at 05:37 PM.
Much appreciated, Sapiento!
Alright, I managed to get some progress done on this map. The main territories have been distributed (still a few locals to add, but most of the formally-recognized areas within the known regions are covered), and added names for stuff.
This is more-or-less how it should look with the Terra Incognita coverage added, indicating the regions yet to be known by the world at large.
And here's a quick concept map to get a general idea of what is going on aroun the place.
I like the clean look of the map. It looks very professional, like directly out of a text- or a rulebook. The new coastline seems natural and fits flawlessly in the space between the two continents.
But what impresses me the most, is the Worldbuilding. Wow, very exciting. Monster hunting Maori, ancient Indian Megafauna Domesticators and Prussian colonialists? What a creative mix. Count me in!
Is there anything more to learn about the project? Have you already published something?
I like the 19th century atlas style you used, it's clear and convenient.
As for the lore, it was pleasing to read. Maybe it's just me, but I'm very tempted to imagine this alternate-history with some steampunk elements here and there...
Thank you both kindly for your comments!
Indeed there is! This map is part of a homemade RPG I've been writing for several years by the name of "Reloj de Vapor: Aventura, Misterio y Superciencia en un Siglo XIX Que Nunca Fué" ("Steamclock: Adventure, Mystery, and Superscience in a XIX Century That Never Was"), which is, surprisingly enough (to me more than anyone) rather close to being finished.Originally Posted by Draupernaut
There's a fully playable beta out there, which, sadly, is only available in Castilian at the moment; as soon as I finish writing the manual, however, I'm sitting down to translate it.
The gist of the setting is that time travel became a possibility in the early XIX century and, while kept mostly a secret, has been actively used by all manners of gents and ladies, Great Powers and Trading Companies, occult societies and hunting enthusiasts, creating this vast, convoluted Ultramonde where you get anything from dinosaur-riding Mongols to automatons searching for the Holy Grail. The central, hidden plot revolves around the fact this has been the umpteenth time this has happened, and that the titular Steamclock is the engine they have been using to try and stop Reality from disappearing altogether -even if it has meant re-creating the world multiple times already.
While the base theme is time travel, I wanted to avoid making 1883's Earth (the year the game is set on) just a starting point, so I've tried to make the Present as capable of holding adventures within itself as any perilous trip through the calendar. It also makes it a lot easier to weave stories that mix past and present. So as a result we get monster-hunting Maori, lightning-wielding Taipings, moving saltpetre-works hitting each other with cannons in Atacama, and the Most Stupendous Yearly Stratonautical Competition of Esteemed Royal Guards, pitching the steam-powered, turbine-propelled, honour-bound personal securities of the Queens of England and Spain in a neck-breaking race through the skies of the Pyrenees clad in highly explosive, but otherwise fancy-looking, mechanical suits.
Hopefully the rules help the game feel like one of dramatic, cinematic, and a little bit histrionic, adventure across a steam-powered XIX century and the mystery-laden hallways of the past. It uses its own d12-based system with a lot of emphasis on taking risks.
Your nose points true, my friend! There's a sizeable selection of smoke-belching engines mashing together the substrates of human ingenuity and madness. In what regards to this map in particular, the idea was to make it as a last great frontier for explorers, but driven mostly by the Great Trading Companies rather than nations, so as to create this general sensation of wild, chaotic, profit-driven adventure, with scant morals, questionable purposes, and ever-changing loyalties. Thus we get bands of mercenaries running around in their steam-powered colossi fighting each other with electrical whips and giant chainsaws; foolishly brave merchant-adventurers bringing top-of-the-line mechanical traps to capture a specimen of the elusive Giant Crimson Canary of Javarta to display back in Paris, only to get eaten by one of said Giant Crimson Canaries of Javarta; skyships returning to port with entire sections chewed off, after attempting to brave the darkened skies of Deepest Lemuria and running into the impossible celic monstrosities that live amongst the thundering clouds.
The game has a very heavy steampunk bend to it, and superscience plays a big role in most stories.
Last edited by Klaus van der Kroft; 02-18-2020 at 11:59 AM.
Made various minor adjustments, added capital capital cities and fixed the limits of Terra Incognita.
I think this should suffice for the map, unless you guys spot any glaring errors that I may have missed, which is rather likely. Next: the map of Hiva and Mu. Moooooo!
This sounds like a great read! Please let me know if you do ever translate it into English. Unfortunately I suffer from a bad case of American monolingualism.
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