Thibault’s Heldann, 8 miles per hex v4
This beautiful piece was Thibault’s final Heldann map, and it also appears to have been his first Hexmapper map. Up until this point, he had been using Grid (along with Paint Shop Pro) since 1997, so this was a really major move for him. He had completed the terrain, rivers, and borders as early as November 2003, but he didn’t finish the labelling and the roads until the next summer.
I don’t think he ever posted this map publicly, although he definitely shared it around privately. The map was closely tied to his Heldann Gazetteer, which also went unpublished for many years. He kindly showed me both of these in mid 2005.
In any case, the map itself is an expert reproduction of his previous Heldann map in the new system, with a new style of highly readable labels. This latter point solved the legibility issues he had been struggling with for years and years, and opened up new possibilities for all of his maps in the future. In fact, this may explain why v3 is dated from the same time as v4: it may be that he redid the labels on the older version before then shifting them to the newer version and adapting them to his new style.
Undoubtedly helping with legibility is the subdued Hexmapper palette, which is a sea change compared to Grid’s VGA-style colours. The difference couldn’t be more striking, and it should come as no surprise that from this point on Thibault spent much of his mapping time converting maps to the new format. However, this was his second blanket revision; with such a vast body of maps to port over yet again, it must have been extremely demotivating for him. What he really wanted to be doing was expanding his 8 mile per hex coverage of the world into new areas, not remaking the same old maps over and over.
Getting back to Heldann, it’s interesting to note the rather striking difference in hex shapes between v3 and v4. Grid’s hexes were quite tall, while Hexmapper’s are far more regular. A quick comparison should reveal just how much it shows. This also has potential ramifications for mapping, but Thibault chose the easiest and most obvious path, viewing hexes as the base unit of mapping and adapting old maps accordingly. This was of course the gold standard in Mystaran cartography for many years, as the hexes allowed maps created by different people in different programs to be easily overlaid and related to each other.
Fan-made Map by Thibault Sarlat (August 2004)
This is an original map created by one of Mystara’s excellent fan cartographers. For more information on the cartographer, including a gallery of all their maps, see also Appendix M: Mappers of Mystara.
Sources
- GAZ7 The Northern Reaches (1988) (PDF at DriveThruRPG)
- GAZ12 The Golden Khan of Ethengar (1989) (PDF at DriveThruRPG)
- TM2 The Eastern Countries (1989) (PDF at DriveThruRPG)
Fan Sources
- Geoff’s Denagoth, 8 miles per hex (1997)
- Geoff’s Heldann, 8 miles per hex (1998)
- Thibault’s Known World, 24 miles per hex v1 (1999)
- Thibault’s Heldann, 8 miles per hex v1 (2000)
- Thibault’s Heldann, 8 miles per hex v2 (2001)
- Thibault’s Heldann, 8 miles per hex v3 (2004)
References
- All of Thibault’s maps at the Atlas of Mystara
- Thibault’s entry in Appendix M: Mappers of Mystara
- Thibault’s author page at the Vaults of Pandius
Chronological Analysis
This is a fan-made map. It was published in August 2004. The updated Atlas version of this map is Heldann, 8 miles per hex. See also Appendix C for annual chronological snapshots of the area. For the full context of this map in Mystara’s publication history, see the upcoming Let’s Map Mystara 2004. (Please note that it may be some time before the project reaches this point.)
The following lists are from the Let’s Map Mystara project. Additions are new features, introduced in this map; Revisions are changes to previously-introduced features; Hex Art & Fonts track design elements; and finally Textual Additions are potential features found in the related text. In most cases, the Atlas adopts these textual additions into updated and chronological maps.
Under Construction! Please check back again soon for updates.
Revisions
- Spellings — Hochstein is likely a typo of Hockstein (Wrath 1992). Tharis is likely a typo for Thariss (Geoff Gander 1998).
