| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Kaladorm |
Posted - 06 Mar 2006 : 10:34:26
We know that Faerun has time zones (mentioned in many novels when they teleport, most recently I think Farthest Reach/Forsaken House).
I was wondering if anyone knows how far out these time zones are spread, and also other things we may take for granted (e.g. assuming there are 24 hours in a day? That the sun rises in the east?)
Many Thanks :) |
| 30 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Returnip |
Posted - 03 Jun 2023 : 10:59:56
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
EDIT: Its hidden. If we take Ed's figure of 8880 for our diameter, that gives us a radius of 4440, or a circumference of 27897.342763877365 miles (so lets just call it 28K because its easier to do the math, and at the scales I am working NO-ONE is going to see that 103 miles anyway). Circumference = Equator, not Diameter.
Because I am a masochist I decided to do this all over again... for the 6th time. I found one last discrepancy that will give us a bit more girth on setting. I can also switch (for the continental outline) from a Mercator to a Gall-Peters projection (which gives me a scientific reason to stretch the continents along the N/S axis). So if I leave the longitude & latitude lines alone, and stretch the continents to a more 'realistic'* projection, things may workout even better.
No matter what I do, though, people in Ten Towns wear shorts in the summer. There really is absolutely no way getting around that. The very top edge of the Faerûnian continent is 1000 miles away (from Icewind Dale), and it falls out precisely where the top edge of Iceland does, and I know people live in Iceland and do just fine. So a 1000 miles north of Ten Towns is weather that is maybe not 'hospitable', but quite livable.
If we decide to ignore the canon about Waterdeep being "just above 45°", and shove Waterdeep north to about 60° that would solve Icewind Dale's apparently magic-induced coldness, but would also completely screw-up where the Equator is, and invalidate too many other things. NO, Waterdeep at 45° works out perfectly in regards to where the tropics should be (so somebody obviously thought about this stuff before).
In 5e they need to feed poor Toril some more Abeir and fatten it up. 
And at this point I think I may be talking to myself - does anyone really care about this stuff but me? 
*"Realistic" is relative, since we do not know what projection our maps have been all along, but if it helps to assume they were Mercator, then that works out on all fronts (because Mercator IS the default projection, usually).
So I was doing some calculations of my own to determine climates a while back and although I was using the 3e map the rough numbers should be applicable.
Anyway, Icewind dale ends up roughly on the same latitude as Scandinavia, and being from Scandinavia myself I can just say that it ain't very cold here. However there are two things that I had to take into account in the comparison, and that's the gulf stream and the westerlies. If you remove both you end up at an average temperature of about 10 degrees celsius less. That's still not cold enough to warrant freezing temperatures for the majority of the year. So what can we infer to bring the average temperature of Icewind Dale down further? Meltwater from the glaciers giving close to zero degrees celsius rivers, and cold winds blowing in from the glaciers.
Anyway, just wanted to add this little piece of info in for anyone who is comparing climates in the realms and our world based on latitude alone.
Also on the actual topic of time and clocks I found this little comment from Ed:
https://www.sageadvice.eu/do-watches-or-clocks-of-any-sort-exist-in-the-forgotten-realms/
In short, measuring hours in Faerûn is starting to become a thing. |
| Akantor |
Posted - 16 Aug 2014 : 20:17:18
Ok thanks. And thanks for the link. It's a wonderful FAQ I didn't know. |
| Kentinal |
Posted - 16 Aug 2014 : 17:33:11
quote:
Originally posted by Akantor
quote:
Originally posted by Kentinal
What was in effect 2003 is that Prime Meridian is Myth Drannor.
Big thanks. Where is it from?
It seams weird as Longitude calculation are some kind of sailor thing and MD is way inland, but why not, may be elves need it for some magical experimentation.
That is from http://www.candlekeep.com/fr_faq.htm#_Toc16090521
As for location of the PM it would tend to be based on a capital at the time people figured out that there was a use for it. Or for any other reason . I am not sure why Greenwich is the PM for Earth.
Oh looked that up as well.
quote:
A prime meridian, based at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, in London,
|
| Akantor |
Posted - 16 Aug 2014 : 17:14:15
quote:
Originally posted by Kentinal
What was in effect 2003 is that Prime Meridian is Myth Drannor.
Big thanks. Where is it from?
It seams weird as Longitude calculation are some kind of sailor thing and MD is way inland, but why not, may be elves need it for some magical experimentation. |
| Kentinal |
Posted - 16 Aug 2014 : 00:52:40
What was in effect 2003 is that Prime Meridian is Myth Drannor.
There is no demanding reason that you use that location of course. Any point can be longitude Zero and go East and West of such until reaching the other side of the planet. |
| Akantor |
Posted - 16 Aug 2014 : 00:10:55
Actually I'm Wiz5/Clc3/MT6, so I can't cast 7nth for the moment. But thx anyway.
My real question was: What's the best location for a greenwich equivalent? |
| Kentinal |
Posted - 15 Aug 2014 : 23:42:29
Akantor you at 14th level and 3.5 can use greater teleport at least two times if you do not want any other 7th level spell for use that day. |
| Akantor |
Posted - 15 Aug 2014 : 23:35:10
Hi and thank you for this wonderful topic. I learned a great deal of things. And, not the least, that I was not the only one to wonder some weird things ;)
A special thanks to Markustay. His maps are just incredible. And the one on the vilhon reach just ended hours of research by locating Amry and Telpir, quoted in the "Fellowship of the purple staff" entry in champion of valor,but never located anywhere.
I have a high level wizzard with teleport, trying to build some great things (just enrolled in the purple staves). So I'm particulary interested in overland informations.
These days I'm trying to specify coordinate for différent places on Faerun. A bit like longitude and latitude. I miss both FRIA and geograph skills to do it properly but I was wondering what would be the best point for a greenwich equivalent (ie longitude start)? Is there canon about that.
-Waterdeep as a port and important city would fit.
- Lantan with its mecanical too (sailor used to have a clock set on greenwich clock to be able to calculate difference).
- Athkatla, as it needs to be good on longitude to reach Maztica.
- Candlekeep?
- Someone talked about MythDrannor. But it's not a port, and calculating longitude is a sailor thing. Other have land feature to travel.
- Somewhere else ?
For the time being, I've use only the main FR3 map scale to have 1pixel = 1mile, and chosed Hlondeth as point of origin (it's the nearest city to the center point). So Ordulin is (-30, 610). |
| Markustay |
Posted - 13 Jan 2013 : 20:52:04
LOL
I could comment on your 'interview style', but I'm too much of a gentleman to do that. I am a member of a couple of cartography sites and none of them 'do math'. Its not supposed to be about inarguable science - its supposed to be about the sheer beauty of the art-form (and old maps are a type of art). If you plan to use any of my maps to get around, then you have way bigger problems then I first realized.
If you've inspired me to do anything, its to NOT do any more FR maps. I am tired of all the 'entitlement' anyway. Thats okay - the PF people have been begging me for some... ado.
@Delwa - Thats a right fine piece of work there, but the equator still seems to be a bit far north. Still, its pretty cool - thanks for posting it. |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 13 Jan 2013 : 20:50:28
Travellers on Toril hardly need GPS accuracy. Old land maps usually depicted interesting objects or features like castles and bridges with oversized illustrations; and these could be found easily enough if one simply followed the terrain and roads and rivers. Old nautical maps were usually drawn more "accurately" in that they accounted for actual relative positions of things, but maps covering large scales would be always distorted in some way by the global curvature ... there was an art to drawing such maps so they would focus on the least-distorted areas of interest. Cartography was indeed a highly developed art which covered a number of different map styles and "viewpoints" different from the top-view coordinate topography used in our modern maps. People were still able to travel by land or sea to different continents and get where they wanted to go.
The non-math involved is what troubles me with judging which maps of Toril are most "accurate". We have no mathematical model to use as an official standard, and no "real world" data from which to model it. So, to me, it seems like trying to establish mathematical distinctions (timezones, etc) with any precision in the Realms is not possible until we get better maps.
I consider FRIA very precise but not very accurate, the point-vector map lines might allow infinitely scalable zooming of any feature, but that doesn't convince me that the features themselves were placed exactly where they should be. It's like linking a measuring instrument with +/- 20% accuracy to a digital display which reports 0.0001% precision.quote:
Brian R. James
As a Forgotten Realms game designer, I can tell you quite definitively that Realms maps are canon.
Furthermore, Markustay's maps are so well regarded by many of us, that his suggested alterations are often incorporated into the official maps as they are updated (thus making his work canon).
This is pretty definitive. And every map of Toril is drawn by artists, without much math involved. Select which art pieces you want to display in your gallery. |
| The Hidden Lord |
Posted - 13 Jan 2013 : 19:56:27
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
I didn't use any math - that's some pretty advanced calculus right there, and I never took calculus.
A map constructed without math... That doesn't sound like cartography to me, more like art.
If I were going to take a journey, I don't think I'd be comfortable navigating with a "map" made by an artist who said that their art piece, er... map, that was just an elaboration of previous artistic speculation, but hey...
YMMV.
(Lol) |
| Mapolq |
Posted - 13 Jan 2013 : 19:23:15
No problem!
Also, The Hidden Lord means 7615 miles in diameter, not circumference. The number on his screenshot, I suppose, is the result the distance calculator on FRIA gives for the circumference of Toril at the equator (approximately PI*7615), in miles - which shows the planet as presented in the FRIA is roughly Earth-sized.
Edit: Reading the entire thread, it seems you're already aware of this, so, yeah. |
| Delwa |
Posted - 13 Jan 2013 : 19:04:41
Arguements aside, (Markustay, I love your maps, and I do use them quite frequently for reference, keep up the good work)on the topic of Timezones in the Realms, I found this in my Google Reader feed the other day, and for a non-cannon source, it can provide a nice reference to arbitrating timezones in the Realms. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 13 Jan 2013 : 16:44:47
I could barely get the entirety of the Faeruturraharan super-continent onto a 10K world - how could it possibly fit on a 7K one? 
Unless you change all know canon distances between locales. Yes, if I gave some sort of bizarro-stretching to the upper (and I suppose lower) portions of the map I could get everything to work (temperature-wise), but I would change the existing canon information we have regarding distances (and at these scales, 140 miles is barely noticeable, so the differences between editions is also negligible).
Reading the beginning of the Fonstad atlas last night, she made the same assumptions I and the FRIA team did - that the maps we have always been looking at are scaled proportionately, and always have been. If anything you would have to push Icewind Dale further south to compensate for the distortion of the world's curvature (which is precisely what the FRIA guys did for those few 'skins' they made for their globe).
I didn't use any math - that's some pretty advanced calculus right there, and I never took calculus. I taught myself trig (so I could take a comp. class two years ahead of schedule), but never bothered with calc - unless you plan to be a scientist, its not much use in day-to-day living. What I did was use two different grids (long. and lat.), one taken from a cartography site, and then one I created myself (because I wasn't thrilled with the first one) which I derived directly from a Hammond map of the Earth. The two pretty-much showed the same info, it was just that distances between longitude lines was slightly off from line to line on that first one (not by much, but I demand perfection). I applied that standard projection grid to our canon maps - thats how I derived my data. I made the same exact assumptions both Karen Fonstad and the FRIA team did, even though they both envisioned the world differently (different sizes - KF didn't have the info we got later, and neither did Slade).
Mapolq made an insanely good point, and I am embarrassed I didn't even consider that - Icewind Dale could very well be on a high plateau - its on the other side of a huge mountains range! I've been thinking about this all wrong - the Himalayas fall-out at the same latitude as Egypt! And we know how we envision both of those places - latitude matters far less then altitude does - shame on me for over looking that point! (and thank you very much Mapolq for pointing that out - RAS gets a reprieve!  )
He still murdered Chewbacca though.
Maybe Drizzt thought he was a yeti......... 
Anyhow, this whole enterprise burnt me out for FR maps for awhile - I won't be getting back to the Faerûn for at least a week or two. That, plus I need to map my new campaign I am running - I've added so many elements into it that the original model is no longer useful. |
| The Hidden Lord |
Posted - 13 Jan 2013 : 15:34:01
Could you answer a couple questions I have regarding your methodology, Markustay?
What points did you use in constructing your geodetic system?
What developable surface did you use to begin your projection?
I also wanted to mention that "my Zakhara" lies between Abeir-Torils equator and the 30th parallel south, with the exception of the Islands of the Utter South, which are somewhat more southerly.
Oh, I also wanted to post a flat map showing Abeir-Toril as Size E planet, one that is 7615 miles across.
http://i.imgur.com/mh2RY.png
|
| Mapolq |
Posted - 13 Jan 2013 : 02:32:07
Do we have any information on the altitude of Icewind Dale? It must get pretty high at least near the slopes of the Spine of the World. I must point, as well, that northern Europe is not necessarily a good model for the region's climate, as it is heavily influenced by the warm waters of the Gulf Stream. The Alaska current also warms up northwestern North America. And given the fact that Waterdeep itself is supposed to be very cold during winter, I think it's a good guess that the Sword Coast is affected by a cold ocean current. If you take a look at the Chilean coast at around 50ºS, you have glaciers like the Southern Patagonian Ice Field, which covers part of the Andes and reaches sea level. That's in part due to the influence of the cold Humboldt Current. What still bothers me, however, is that, being so close to the sea, these regions don't have huge extremes of temperature. So Icewind Dale could be very cold, but I can't imagine it having worse winters than the Silver Marches, which are away from the moderating influence of the sea. In my "model", Icewind Dale would probably average around 0ºC in winter, and could often get down to -20ºC... but not -40ºC and lower like you'll probably see in the Silver Marches, the Anauroch and north of the Ride, unless it's on substantially higher altitudes. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 12 Jan 2013 : 23:34:00
Okay, I didn't want to put the file on my DeviantART account because it didn't contain any 'art' by me (I did hand-draw a couple of things, but just to fix where map sections didn't meet correctly). The site I usually use for 'other stuff' was photobucket, but they shrink everything down. So I had to find a free pic hosting site, and one that supported very large files - the best I could find was Imgur (which was a great find BTW - they don't even ask you to join!) I still had to reduce the file down to 10 meg, so I lost quite bit, but that was the best I could do.
The map of the 10K wide version of Toril, which is presumably the one from the Fonstad atlas and the Realmspace product. This map assumes this is the only continent on the planet, and the distances match the canon distances found on other maps (which is a lot harder then it looks).
Waterdeep is still "just above 45º" - I even pushed it a tad further, since we had some leeway with that statement. Now Icewind Dale is around 57º, or about the same latitude as Northern Scotland. Not great, but much better then before. The equator has moved WAY up to just below Calimshan. Considering they call it "The Lake of Steam" I figure thats okay. It also falls out dead-center of the Raurin desert, which works for us.
However, Zakhara has just gotten colder. A LOT colder... part of it is in the antarctic circle! So, assuming this is indeed the way the world is supposed to be (and the FRIA and the map in the 3e campaign are 'just pictures', as Hidden Lord proclaims), then we must also assume that this world - this 'Toril' - doesn't have Zakhara. Karen Fonstad never showed Zkahra, just Kara-Tur. She showed the southern portion just trailing off.
Ergo, if this is the way the world is supposed to really be (and Ten towns STILL isn't cold enough), then we have to also assume that Hidden Lord's Zakhara has sultans that wear those furry Russian hats instead of Turbans and they get around in 'flying sledges' instead of on flying carpets, becuase DAMN, its cold in that thar Zakhara!
Evermeet is fine - the FRIA map (just that one) did have Evermeet way too far north - my apologies on that one. My bad. I even checked the Maztica maps (the only one that shows the relative position of Evermeet to Faerûn). Of course, Maztica doesn't exist either - that was just a figment of our imaginations (since it couldn't possibly fit on this tiny world).
There is no other way to present the data - the only way to get Icewind Dale further north without changing the canon distances is to shrink the world, and I did just that, finding two sources that 'sort of' confirmed the possibility (the last post was a joke, BTW... in case anyone didn't get that). Every time I try to correct Icewind dales latitude it screws up a bunch of other stuff. It has to have some other explanation (and like I said, there could actually be a logical scientific one - I just don't know that much about weather).
I call this world 'Edtopia', or as the spelljammers like to call it, "The gentleman's planet". 
I am only going to keep that up for a couple of days - I don't want anyone to think any of that is 'right'. I was very hesitant about posting it in the first place. I do find the idea of Evermeet being relatively close to the Japan-clone islands rather interesting though. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 11 Jan 2013 : 18:20:14
Nah, I'm good - I'm just falling in love with FR all over again ATM. Now that I have everything glued together I can take it all in in all its glorious majesty. {sigh}
I've pretty much just been staring at this thing for the past hour. 
The file is massive, but it was worth it. Once I apply this map to a globe (and I can even do a polar projection!) we can see how Karen Fonstad envisioned the planet, which is what I assume Slade was going by for his SJ info. ED also once said that the Fonstad atlas maps were "the closest to my originals". So here's my thinking - that IS the FORGOTTEN REALMS - the original. That world we've been thinking of as the realms - Abeir-Toril - is really just the published rpg setting. The smaller planet(oid?) is "Ed's world" (even though I have both K-T and Zakhara on there) - thats where ALL the novels take place! Thats why Drizzt has been so damn cold. 
The planet Abeir-Toril is a different world then the Forgotten Realms - they are very similar in many ways, but very different in others.
So now we have three canon FR worlds - the smaller one, the one thats the same size as Earth, and the one thats 12% bigger. There were two, but then Abeir and Toril were split apart, so now there's three. Abeir and the Forgotten Realms were probably the one that was originally split apart (sundering Ed's Realms from bits and pieces of itself)) - thats why they are so much smaller.
A world for everyone! I completely nuked canon with this argument. We were never playing on the same world the novels were set on. |
| Xnella Moonblade-Thann |
Posted - 11 Jan 2013 : 09:08:59
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
Just for fun, I want to see how things work out when I build This world. (which should be the 10K wide planet Slade was talking about in Realmspace).
I believe I have user-made* a map of Faerûn (it may be 2e era because of how some areas are marked) that looks a lot like the world in the picture in the link. That map is a .pdf file, and if you like I can give it to you to use if you need to. I believe it differs enough from anything WotC has that it may help you in your mapping.
*I assume this map of mine is user-made because the text for places looks like handwriting and someone had possibly scanned the map and made it into a .pdf file because of its size. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 11 Jan 2013 : 04:52:53
quote:
Originally posted by The Hidden Lord
I think you got, Markustay, when you referenced FRIA file lodt3a.bmp!
On that map, Icewind Dale lies about 1100 miles of north of Waterdeep, and since a degree of latitude is equivalent to ~69 miles, that would place Icewind Dale at about 60 degrees north, a quite chilly region of Faerun, to be sure.
Nice work!
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
[br
Since the distance between any two lines of latitude = 1037.5 miles, that would mean Ten Towns could not be more then about half a latitude line away, and half the distance would place it right around 52.5º (45º + 1/2(15º). If we use the most generous number of 700 miles and plug-in the 1037.5 mile figure we get 67%, or 2/3, which work out rather neatly to 10º distance from 45º, still only giving us 55ºN.
Except that the lodt3a map is 'squashed' form the Trail maps it is derived from (and the Zakhara campaign map). That map is NOT a flat map - it was meant as a 'skin' for the globe. Because the FRIA guys felt the need to distort it smaller, that means they assumed the maps we have always been using were already distorted - that makes the squashed lodt3a map the 'real' way the continents look, and the distances are actually compressed from other maps.
I've been working hard at this all day - I will post something tomorrow - I still have to clean them up a wee bit. From what I have so far, I can tell the lodt3a map is 16% smaller in the height (thats the percentage I had to stretch it to make it line-up with the trail maps perfectly).
The only thing I have really proven thus far is that I (quite on my own) came to the same conclusions as the FRIA team, and that the existing campaign maps are all already stretched. That means those should be used as-is for a projection map (although what projection, exactly, is still up to debate - they are all off in some way).
I'll try to post the two maps side-by-side tomorrow - you can really see how flattened the FRIA globe map looks compared to the trail maps. The sad thing is, I have been working on this since last night (now 24 hours), and it was just to facilitate something completely different I am making (a map based only on the Fonstad Atlas/Realmspace data). When I realized the FRIA globe maps were squashed I had to start from scratch again. Just for fun, I want to see how things work out when I build This world. (which should be the 10K wide planet Slade was talking about in Realmspace).
Ha! I have proven the Toril in Realmspace is not the same planet Toril as the one in FR... go figure. |
| Kajehase |
Posted - 11 Jan 2013 : 02:32:59
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Back to timezones ... I'm not sure there are any nations on Toril large enough to actually span multiple timezones. My understanding is that Shou is really more of a paper empire composed of many smaller nation-regions.
Might be worth pointing out that prior to the need for unified railroad timetables, pretty much every nation that used minutes in their timekeeping had multiple timezones. Well, perhaps not Luxembourg. |
| JohnLynch |
Posted - 11 Jan 2013 : 01:10:28
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
Not sure if anyone is even bothering to follow these over-long posts about my methodology (you can all thank Hidden lord for them), but whatever.
I'm finding them quite interesting. I just don't have anything to really contribute except "wow" |
| The Hidden Lord |
Posted - 10 Jan 2013 : 22:14:59
I think you got, Markustay, when you referenced FRIA file lodt3a.bmp!
On that map, Icewind Dale lies about 1100 miles of north of Waterdeep, and since a degree of latitude is equivalent to ~69 miles, that would place Icewind Dale at about 60 degrees north, a quite chilly region of Faerun, to be sure.
Nice work!
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
[br
Since the distance between any two lines of latitude = 1037.5 miles, that would mean Ten Towns could not be more then about half a latitude line away, and half the distance would place it right around 52.5º (45º + 1/2(15º). If we use the most generous number of 700 miles and plug-in the 1037.5 mile figure we get 67%, or 2/3, which work out rather neatly to 10º distance from 45º, still only giving us 55ºN.
|
| Neil |
Posted - 10 Jan 2013 : 21:07:13
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Back to timezones ... I'm not sure there are any nations on Toril large enough to actually span multiple timezones. My understanding is that Shou is really more of a paper empire composed of many smaller nation-regions.
Calimshan, Tethyr and Amn might spread far enough from west to east to have more than one, but since: 1) it's uncommon to travel fast enough for that to matter and 2) there isn't much in the way of portable, accurate time pieces, I don't think that it's much of an issue except perhaps for the occasional sage. Someone in Netheril probably gave it some thought though. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 10 Jan 2013 : 20:55:23
Well, they really don't even have the 'timezone' concept. Thats just for us so we have something we can relate to. The sun doesn't actually jump by 1 hour spans so you have to figure there really are millions of teensy 'timezones' - the sun does indeed come up in western Cormyr just slightly earlier then it does in eastern cormyr (and Cormyr is pretty damn small).
By the same token, If I am standing on one side of the timezone/longitude line, and my friend is standing on the other side, it doesn't mean it gets dark and hour earlier for me - that would be silly. Even in the RW that does not happen; it may be an hour later where me friend is (three feet away from me), but the sun doesn't give a rats arse abut timezones. I remember running back-and forth on the Hoover Damn yelling, "I'm a time traveler!" Folks (including my wife) thought I was nuts.
Anyhow, there are no timeszones in Toril - the map is just meant as a handy reference, is all.
The software I would love to see is something that allowed you to create beautiful maps, and not just of FR. I used to make amazing game maps using the mapping engine in the HOMM game. There were decent ones in at least two other games I used to use (same premise - fantasy mass combat) but I can't recall their names.* Anyhow, those were just modding adds for existing games, and I was able to do more with them then any program specifically designed for this. Sucks i don't have those games anymore.
*I believe one was Age of Wonders. Man, I miss all those turn-based fantasy battles games. Damn Warcrack knocking everyone else out of the market - I'm too old to do 'real time'. |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 10 Jan 2013 : 20:26:38
Back to timezones ... I'm not sure there are any nations on Toril large enough to actually span multiple timezones. My understanding is that Shou is really more of a paper empire composed of many smaller nation-regions. |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 10 Jan 2013 : 20:19:14
Ha, PFS would use their latest and greatest map engine if given another shot at this lucrative license. I doubt the petition will ever successfully inspire WotC to make another FRIA, but it might be enough to eventually convince Hasbro/Atari to release their grips on their IPs. A dead IP doesn't produce revenue and currently they're basically choking the life out of it with their relentless strangleholds.
But to be objective, FRIA is a marginally ambitous and impressive application for its time. I think it could have turned a lot worse (and I mean a *lot* worse), but it also might have turned out significantly better ... PFS did a passable job then and I expect they would probably do a passable job now (assuming they've kept up on technology), but I think it might be better to take a chance employing a different company to develop FRIA ver 2.0 with the best aspects of FRIA as the minimum standard. |
| Markustay |
Posted - 10 Jan 2013 : 19:57:01
I signed that years ago - I truly doubt it will get anywhere.
Besides, I think the software's way out-dated. Its nice to have, but clunky as hell (and actually omits areas, Shadowdale for one!). I am hoping they are working on 'something' new for 5e - there were some hints in that direction (Wyatt mentioned 'scalable terrain' IIRC).
My comp is having a cow right now - by trying to paste every available map together (the world is mine! ) I've created a file that GIMP says is 5 times too large. GIMP is a wimp - I'm pretty sure I created larger in PS. Not that its not doing what I want, its just reeeeeaaaal slow, and my tower is making lots of 'thrashing' noises.
Must... have.... more.... POWER!!! |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 10 Jan 2013 : 17:55:38
Incidentally, ProFantasy Software maintains an internet petition to republish their FRIA. More signatures and more visibility means more chance of Wizbro becoming aware of this demand, although Atari and Hasbro are very territorial over their relevant licensing rights. |
| Neil |
Posted - 10 Jan 2013 : 16:53:12
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
He also wrote that in the 2e era, s one must wonder why he referenced Leira as still being around? Moving forward, thats something else to consider. Instead of a mistake, we can work with that (and he was aware of the ToT, because he DID reference that).
Leira wasn't killed until after the Time of Troubles, and it was years later until someone really came out and said she was dead (Cyric in 'Prince of Lies'). Realmspace was written in the gap between Forgotten Realms Adventures and Prince of Lies, so it's possible that the decision for Cyric to kill Leira hadn't been made yet. |
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