Cities Discussion

[Diethe]

Hrmm...I'm reviewing the map. I like how there's a bit more moorish influence when it came to the northwest but still has a bit spanish/ivalician brittanic influence near the south and center, would I be given a bit of free range in terms of titling the cities? I wish to for example, name Vaseria to be 'Ancient City Vaseria' thats one of the last bastions of Pharism in the continent. Likewise, naming for example Qalat Mazar and Qalat Zabud merely as Mazar Fortress or Zabud Castle.

[Schwerpunkt]

;.; wryyy

But seriously, I expect to most places to get new names (like "Ancient City," although I'd prefer to reserve "Ancient" for Viura) as part of the final naming process. And some of those that survive (like "Busharat") will probably be corrupted in some fashion. It's like how the city isn't named simply "Sal Ghidos" -- that's simply how we refer to it. I think the players expect it.

So, in Zelamonia we have:
Burstel Ruins (keep as-is)
Istel (title as you see fit)
Vaseria (see above, though I have preference towards something implying that it's a port city)
Kaldemar (see above)
Yorenai (see above)
Busharat (I'll figure something out)
az-Zafarah ("az-Zafarah Farmlands")

Ordallia
Qataniya ("The Desert City of Qataniya")
Viura ("Ancient Demesne of Viura"?)
Laqant ("The White City of Laqant")
Qalat ____ (feel free to convert "Qalat" to "Fort" in most cases)
Qalat Zabud ("The Citadel of Zabud" or "Zabud Citadel" -- "citadel" carries stronger connotations than "fort")

Minor typo. al-Wasir should be spelled 'al-Wazir.' And if "al-" ever leads a name, it should remain lowercase.

Jayyan ("The Jayyan Crossroads")
al-Qantara ("The al-Qantara Crossing")
Dhalikar ("The Dhalikar Garrison")
Sand Wastes ("The Sand Wastes of Qadis")
Qawasqar ("The Ravines of Qawasqar")
al-Munakarh ("The Pass at al-Munakarh")
Bayda ("The Bayda Sands")


Romanda
Taiga ("The Enavian Taiga")
Mount ("Mount Karsi")
Ronka ("Ronkan Ruins")
Khus, Falgabard, and Semitt are still works in progress.

I think that's everything. Poke me if it's not.

[Diethe]

Alright, no prob. So just 4 places for Romanda then? Hit me up with possible minor places for Romanda as well I guess. All I see are wilderness and major cities.

UPDATE: It's gonna look something like this. Of course, with labels, map markers (probably shields for occupation) and probably trees. Take note the architectural differences, heh, but I hope the sizes and the markers make sense. Like how a small keep is only a fort, a larger one a castle and the biggest ones are the capital. Same goes for small hamlets/villages and locations vs. the double roofed cities.



And also, the map so far. Nelveska was actually a naval base used by Ordallia during the war. In the meantime, I'm thinking perhaps that we could loosen up the empire and not have too much control over the southern cities.

[Schwerpunkt]

Minor tweaks.



Added two wilderness points for Ordallia -- al-Ejaz ("the barrier) as a mountain crossing between Zelamonia and Qatariyah and al-Ghwarziyan to represent the northern steppe territories. Additionally, I tweaked the Yorenai-az-Zafarah path so that you didn't need to sink another AP to pass through Busharat.

Also added the Ostlig Fjords in eastern Romanda because it seemed appropriate.



I really like the little trees on the map. They look neat.

[Diethe]

I might add a small settlement up north of Istlig Fjords to connect it to that Taiga area. Perhaps a small viking/raider/pirate village? Lol. Dunno.

Also, I really like the translations and the culture you gave Romanda! Sorta like how an Ivalician would see an Ordallian and vice versa and how they would call different stuff by different names. I'm even considering rolling as an Ordallian just to see. In the meantime, I'll use some of the 'Ivalician english' naming conventions for the map, but I'll be sure to consider all the connotations and different naming conventions in game.

Update: Here it is so far, heh. Note Riovanes having Romandan architecture according to lore. You know where I suck? Roads.



I also plan on adding wilderness encounter on the sea, like "Romanda Crossing" where you might get nabbed by pirates or tentacle things.

I suggest, if Illium is listening, to limit the threads and topics related to places to mere regions like a Gallione or Riovanes Forum and people can have the liberty to post threads there, with cities having sticky threads. There's going to be a LOT of places from what I see and too much forums and topics will clutter up the board. EDIT: Correction, heh. It's actually the factions having their own boards that made the board a bit cluttered heh. Maybe we could have just one 'Factions' Forum with a topic for each faction.

[Schwerpunkt]

I'm totes rolling an Ordallian. There's just so much stuff. I'll be delving a bit deeper into religion (I want Dhalin al-Din to have some sort of proscription against certain types of magic just to really demonstrate that it's far more restrictive than the other religions in-game). Then it's off to finalizing any remaining cultural stuff (I'll probably do a short bit on Altenian, Rozarrian, Ghwarzian, and Kharkonid cultures). Then Zelamonia, which will be a project and a half (I'll be giving it some Slavic influences, which will mean lots of studying). And, once Zelamonia's settled, it's time to hammer Romanda out.

And I wouldn't object to a small town located in the far northeast of Romanda. I could write it in fairly easily.

Extremely minor tweaks: Thieves' Fort will be getting a different name/backstory (because "Thieves' Fort" is so bland). Qalat Zabud should be physically larger than the other Qalats (I'd scale it up to maybe 150% the size) to represent the fact that it's Ordallia's answer to Bethla and Ziekden.


Edit: Can't really keep beating around the bush and dragging our heels on this. Romandan town names.

Khus Castle -> Kronsvik ("The Crown's Bay")
Semitt City -> Forsborg ("The Waterfall City") [And I promise, this isn't named as such because I liked Forsberg when he could make it through most of a season]
Falgabard -> Myrkholt ("The Dark Woodlands")
Random Northern Viking Settlement -> Svellakr ("The Icefields")

Also, what about making the area north of Nelveska the 'Sea of Storms'? Thoughts on that?

[kablizzy]

God, I love you guys.

[Ilium]

Apr 18, 2013 17:02:44 GMT -6 Diethe said:

I suggest, if Illium is listening, to limit the threads and topics related to places to mere regions like a Gallione or Riovanes Forum and people can have the liberty to post threads there, with cities having sticky threads. There's going to be a LOT of places from what I see and too much forums and topics will clutter up the board. EDIT: Correction, heh. It's actually the factions having their own boards that made the board a bit cluttered heh. Maybe we could have just one 'Factions' Forum with a topic for each faction.

Great work so far Diethe! On the point of the Faction boards, these I had planned to make invisible during the game, sort of like your traditional kingdom threads from other sims. Join a faction, get added to that member group, and the forum opens up for you. Staff would still see each board how they are now, though.

[Diethe]

Ah, no problems then Illium.

I'll go ahead and add those personal flavours Schwer. The Sea of Storms sounds just fine. Looking at the map, I'd say it was sort of like the epicenter of the Cataclysm and tore asunder most of western Ordallia and separated Romanda from the mainland. I mean c'mon, look at those jagged areas. I like the cultural flavours as well. I'll try to opt for being able to make my own map thread (Easily editable by admins of course). I'll make sure there's small city descriptions and translations for them. Hrmm...you can PM me a definitive list of the names, areas, translations and such so it wont be much of a bother and we can focus on other areas of the Sim that needs working, but I guess hey, this is the Cities Discussion thread anyway heh.

[Schwerpunkt]

I still have to deal with Zelamonia. Once that's out of the way, I'll get an updated list of final names for Ordallian places and such.

Were you planning on putting the "native" names directly on the map?

[Diethe]

I'll probably use Ivalician for the markers just for map uniformity and to save space, then translations on the post I make regarding the map. I'd have a sort of info on the cities just below the image.

[Schwerpunkt]

M'kay. I think this is our final list of places for all of Ordallia.


Cities
The Silver City of Istel
The Arcane City of Yorenai
The Mountain City of Kaldemar
The Port City of Vaseria
The Bright City of Laqant
The Desert City of Qataniyah ("The Desert City of the Elephant Court" is a really weird name for a city, but whatever)
Viura

Forts
The Fortress of al-Gharb
The Fortress of Mazar
The Fortress of al-Wazir
The Zabud Citadel

Locations
The Ruins of Burstel
The Jayyan Crossroads
The Crossing at al-Qantara
The Bayda Sands
The Sand Wastes of al-Qarakhoriya
The Ravines of Qawasqar
The Pass at al-Munakarh ("The Mountain Pass...." ?)
The Pass at al-Ejaz ("The Mountain Pass...." ?)
The Dhalikar Garrison
The Steppes of al-Ghwarziyan
The Grasslands of Busharat
The Farmlands at az-Zafarah
The Naval Station of Nelbhaskyah Nelveska

[Diethe]

Perfect, thanks. I'm thinking about adding a sort of ancient city for Ordallia that perhaps survived the cataclysm and remained with an Ydoran or Pharist culture. Yorenai's the magick city I see.

Tell me what you'd like for Thieves' Fort as well.

[Schwerpunkt]

I have no idea what Ydoran culture would even look like. Greek, maybe?

There's plenty of Viuran Farism going around in Zelamonia (the rationale being it's easier to convert to that than the super-restrictive brand of Ordallian monotheism). Not much point in bringing it in.

Anyway, Yorenai's the magic city because I literally ran out of ideas. Even "Silver City" seems kind of weak after I made it a point to stress that Laqant is white.



The good news is Ordallia's just about done. I'll start whacking at Romanda soonish.

[Diethe]

Map looking good so far.

Some issues:
-Thieves' Fort Name.
-Since Fort Besselat is Nanten's de-facto HQ, I'm thinking Ziekden's the Hokuten's especially against Romanda.
-We definitely need a lot more small icons in both Ivalice and Ordallia. Probably invent 'em. Some forts, villages, mining/farming towns, etc.