Making a good map: Tips

Teddy945

Member
About me: (just if your curious)
I love making things, always have. Legos for days as a kid. I love the Idea of having other people enjoy something you made. Drawing, origami, Sculpting, and of course map making. I played many games where you can make things. The X box game Halo made me crazy. I made so many maps. It was a whole other world of people who like making things like me. making so many maps made me (I think) really good at the creative part, not so much the mechanics. Here are some of my creations...
Okay I don't think you guys care :confused:
ALLLME_zps78855465.png

When Legions Introduced the map Editor I just had to try it out, And there was so much more!
Okay. I'm not the Greatest when it comes to the Gameplay of a map. (that's why I made Mini Games) Honestly I'm Probably the worst at it, but I do think that I am Good at making maps visually appealing, and maybe I can Pass some words of wisdom to anyone who wants to make their map look better.
Okay First off when you are starting a map you usually want to have an idea of what your going for. How you want the layout to be like, and the theme. I start out with adding structure and building the terrain around that. You want the player to understand somewhat what is going on.
ShorelineMidbase_zpsc56da473.png

(shut up I know the map was Terrible) Okay, now looking at this you can see that the name Shoreline somewhat describes the map. Sand and Dirt Give the Idea that there could have been water at some point in time. Also when you put structures on a map you want them Built into the Map not just sitting on top of the terrain. Give some believability to it! if its grass maybe there are small plants surrounding the buildings, if its sand maybe part of the building has been buried. The point is you want the player to understand the beauty of the map.
Be unique! yea there are buildings already given to you. yea they look nice but make something the player has never seen before. Try flipping the piece side ways, up side down. make it look new.
OutcastHome_zpsc7e19fe9.png

(Oh my god, I know they all suck, just go with it Okay?) originally this piece was Ugly. It had some weird corners and overall was gross. Doesn't mean you cant use it. Cover the ugly side to make it look nice and even. surround it with rocks, add lights.
In my opinion High contrast colors look awesome. it makes the terrain pop. and with high contrast colors you can tell diferent stories for different parts of the map. when making the cap routs of a map. Always make them worn out. by doing this the player understands that these are the areas where players travel most.
scabrous_zps348150e0.png

("Wow its so ugly"... no comment) This was one of my first maps. I was trying to give the idea that this snowy area was now melting away revealing the volcanic terrain underneath. The base is surrounded by dirt, indicating that this part of the map is used the most. The colors of the map are definitely something to take time and think about. The Pieces sky and terrain should, In my opinion, fall under the same type of theme. If you want to, try to mess with the fog color and visual distance. lighting too.
Well from what I've learned. what makes a Great map is the art of simplicity. when you start to make a map and you look to see how what the map is, not from a players point of view but from a creators point of view you'll see that the map does not have that much to it. just a couple of hills but the place those hills are placed changes everything. think about it. why did shoreline fail so much? well what I have concluded is that it is so large with so many hills no one knew what the basic routs where. Frostbyte on the other hand is the opposite. small with very simple hills everyone knows what to do. so don't go too crazy and add to many things on your map because you just might overwhelm the player.
One last point I want to go over, If your one of the few still reading this, is starting from scratch. Yes other maps have great terrain but if you use that your not really creating something new. people will notice. maybe if you want to practice making maps you can remake one of the maps, But I think it is always better to start with a blank map with flat terrain.
New1_zpsdbcfba9e.png

This is my newest Creation (I might have made more maps since this was posted) for all of my maps I start from nothing. It may loom massive but that just because of all the fog. I use the Frostbyte terrain because that map seems to be perfect. I made the mistake of making shoreline on forgotten. I recommend if you want to make a map use frostbyte's size.
yeayea_zpsf88330ea.png

Well thanks for reading this ( I'm extremely surprised if anyone did ) and keep making maps! I am in no way saying I'm good map maker for legions I just have some tips. I hoped my advice helped

ps: I will post download links of this map later
 

Jello

Contributor
I haven't made a map in quite a while though so I can't really tell people whether to choose size 8 or 16, but there's one thing I don't agree with, its this
I recommend if you want to make a map use frostbyte's size.

It's true that using Frostbyte's size works for most/all maps but I can't work with a size 8, its too cramped, can't add all the stuff I want to add to make the map look good, have a nice feeling to it, so I usually (most of the time) work with a size 16, if legions supported a size 10-14 I'd be fine with that but the terrain gets wonky when you change it to a 10-14 size...That's just what I think and If I happen to make a size 8 map it's horrible (like all of my maps) lol on another note, this map looks fresh as hell.

New1_zpsdbcfba9e.png

yeayea_zpsf88330ea.png
 
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