Basic campaigns only get **zero** maps?!?

dougirwin13

OK we are a basic campaign at the moment. One of my players started it and transferred it over to me.

Being a new campaign in an off-the-beaten-path forner of the Forgotten Realms we didn't really have a map, just a location.

Well the play who created the campaign updated a segment of the main FR map, with our location circled, as the "map". Which was fine.

Now I've just finished the actual campaign map and went to upload it. "Basic campaigns can only have 1 map", which is fair enough.

So I deleted the old map. BUt I still get the "Basic campaigns can only have 1 map" message?!?

So in effect we can't have any maps now :(

Has anyone else come across this? Does anyone have any suggestions to fix it? And no, I can't upgrade to a paid account. Not this month.

TIA for any assistance!
Doug

dougirwin13

Looks like I just needed to wait 5 mins for it to fix itself up.

Werid. I didn't do anything different.

dougirwin13

And now most of the map I uploaded is cut off?

arsheesh

Hey there dougirwin13,

First off, Welcome to the Portal. I ran into the same issue you did regarding uploading maps. The problem is that if your map isn't perfectly square, then you run the risk of having portions of it cut off. The solution I came up with was to upload my map to a Image hosting site (I use Photobucket but there are many others as well), post a small image of my map on my Locations page, and then directly link that small image to the larger map image. Here's a link to my "Locations Page":http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaign/tales-of-darkmoon-vale/wikis/places so you can see what I mean. If you want to try something similar but need help figuring out the Textile code to do this, let me know and I can show you how to do it.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

dougirwin13

Hi Arsheesh!

Yeah my map is fairly wide :-)

It's on my campaign [url=http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaign/rhedden/maps]map page[/url] for now. I'm thinking of moving my images off to my main website server. I've got unlimited storage there.

I'm pretty handy with BBCode, html and PHP so I don't expect to have any problems with Textile :-P So far it's been like a more limited BBCode that is more HTML friendly.

Thanks for the link, exactly the kind of thing I was just thinking of doing :)

Cheers! And thanks for your thoughts and the link! Greatly appreciated!
Doug

Curufea

The great advantage I've found of Textile over BBcode is the ability to have tables :)

dougirwin13

You can't use tables in BBCode? Maybe I'm using some descendant of BBCode instead :)

Curufea

Or maybe I just hung out on forums with deliberately crippled versions of bbcode....

dougirwin13

LOL! Yeah maybe.

In left the uploaded map where it is. The full map is linked from my "campaign geology page":http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaign/rhedden/wikis/geography

Thanks all!

RaseCidraen

I'd link to my wiki in shameless self-promotion, but you can find it through my profile. (I'm trying to be expedient. Side notes aren't expedient. Darn it!!!)

I think I did a fairly good job with my map representations... particularly Sigil and most of it's subsections, and the Outer Planes... (Some of Sigil isn't finished though...drat!)

dougirwin13

Not bad!

I just map the world as my PCs currently know it :D

Curufea

That works - although maps of places the PCs haven't been to yet can often inspire them to explore, and that leads to them generating plot :)

dougirwin13

Ah the PCs haven't been to any of them :) They just have an itty bit of knowledge of them from their backstory. Teasers... I like teasers :P

Curufea

Teasers are good :)

There are lots of great ways to motivate players - including solving mysteries that bug them, fixing problems they can see will get worse, irritating them with bad guys until they do something about it, enticing them with knowledge or power, or just new vistas of opportunity...

dougirwin13

Oh yes there are lots of fun tricks!

I'm quite partial to building from backstory. I give rewards for them investing in backstory, typically a consumable magic item or around 100gp value of additional gear at level 1. (I'm fond of rewards and a big believer in RP XP, BTW)

Taking the backstory and personality of all the PCs and putting them togethor is a lot of fun. Common threads are obviously useful, but I really enjoy building on the elements of discord too. This gives me an interesting pool of factors I can point various short and long term campaign and plot ideas at.

dougirwin13

How do you find the Dr Who system plays/GMs?

It looks easy to pick up and my kids are Dr Who fans so I was thinking of running a couple of short adventures using that system.

Curufea

Hmm, hard to say - this is my first foray and I'm not running a "Doctor Who" style/genre game - it's more adult/Torchwood in style.

However, from what I've read in the rules and on the boards for DWAITAS where folk are actually keeping to the style it's designed for - it all looks good. The Storypoint mechanic solves a multiple of TV series tropes that can't be duplicated in traditional systems. The "fudge" factor they provide is essential for a Who style game. It's all meladrama and pulp, and if you bog it down with real science and simulationist thinking, you're not going to be playing Doctor Who.

It's not as "collaborative storytelling" in mechanic as some indie games I've read/got/played - but it certainly is a step in that direction. It's another thing I'm all for - giving narrative power to players so together we create something, rather than GM-action/Player-reaction.

I'd also add, I'm running the DWAITAS game online - and I do think it is more suited for face-to-face gaming.

dougirwin13

Thanks, that's very informative and sounds alot like what I'd hoped for - I've only had a chance to look through the book for 15 mins you see :)

Curufea

I highly recommend having a look at the games folk report about on the "DWAITAS boards":http://dwaitas.proboards.com

dougirwin13

Thanks for the link! I'm reading the Q&A forum now :)