# Which is best?  Campaign Cartographer?  Dundjinni?



## Emirikol (Apr 11, 2008)

What is the best map creation tool out there?  Dundjinni?  Campaign Cartographer 3?  Other?

Thanks in advance for your opinion.

Jay H


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## Nylanfs (Apr 12, 2008)

Define "best"

Most versital is Campaign Cartographer, but it has a VERY high learning curve if you don't know anything about CAD programs

Dundjinni is very good and makes pretty maps, but creating your own content other than the basic ground features I found to be difficult.


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## Glyfair (Apr 12, 2008)

There are also issues with program performance.  I haven't heard any CC3 issues, but I have had pretty good systems since it was released.  I have heard some horror stories with DunDjinni, but I'm not sure they still apply.

Regardless, either certainly work much better with more up-to-date systems.  For DunDjinni I'd want better than for CC3.


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## heruca (Apr 12, 2008)

Nylanfs said:
			
		

> Dundjinni is very good and makes pretty maps, but creating your own content other than the basic ground features I found to be difficult.



One of the best "features" of Dundjinni is its User Community, which creates new free art for the program _every single day_. If you can't find something you need, and you don't have the skills to make it yourself, you can place an art request on the forums, and in most cases, someone will make it for you.


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## TheAuldGrump (Apr 14, 2008)

Nylanfs said:
			
		

> Define "best"
> 
> Most versital is Campaign Cartographer, but it has a VERY high learning curve if you don't know anything about CAD programs
> 
> Dundjinni is very good and makes pretty maps, but creating your own content other than the basic ground features I found to be difficult.



Actually, CC3 has a lot more shallow a learning curve than CC2 did, and a decent tutorial to boot. A lot of the reputation that CC has in regards to the learning curve has been addressed. I was able to get decent looking maps in about 15 minutes of fiddling, even before using the tutorial. The only thing lacking right now is a full and detailed manual, which has been 'coming soon' ever since CC3 came out....

Not necessary, like I said it is fairly easy to learn, but it would still be nice.

The Auld Grump, one of those folks who only opens the manual after messing around for a while.


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## Mercule (Apr 14, 2008)

TheAuldGrump said:
			
		

> Actually, CC3 has a lot more shallow a learning curve than CC2 did, and a decent tutorial to boot. A lot of the reputation that CC has in regards to the learning curve has been addressed. I was able to get decent looking maps in about 15 minutes of fiddling, even before using the tutorial. The only thing lacking right now is a full and detailed manual, which has been 'coming soon' ever since CC3 came out....



This.  I picked it up quite some time ago and had just enough time to start getting comfortable with it before other priorities took precedence (I have four kids and am involved in quite a few community/church activities).

When I made the conscious decision to reduce complexity in my prep time, this was one of the first casualties, so I can't give you many tips.  I'm actually pretty darn good with colored pencils, but I do the rest of my game prep on the computer and had wanted a "native" map instead of scanning stuff in.

So, I guess what I'm saying is that CC3 shouldn't scare you if you actually have some time to devote to cartography and learning a new skill.  It's extremely powerful and not unreasonable to use.  But, if you're pressed for time and looking to use the computer to speed things up, then you might want to pass on it because there is some up-front opportunity cost.


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## ki11erDM (Apr 16, 2008)

Before you buy ether one of those try this:
http://autorealm.sourceforge.net/index.php

I own CC3, after spending well over 30 hours of hard work and using ever tutorial I could find and spending days on the news groups I finally ripped my keyboard out of my computer and smashed the hell out of it against my wall.  That is how pi$$ed off I got at the darn program.  It is a HUGE challenge to do things that should be extremely simple.  If you are going to be a professional then learn it… if not I hope your anger management is better than mine.  Worst money I have ever spent.

CC3 is a perfect example of people confusing “powerful” with “useful”.  In this day and age of slick and easy to use UIs CC3 fails on an epic level.

Is autorealm perfect?  Heck no.  But only put in a few hours and have made a very workable map and every question I have had was answer in the help file.

As for Dundjinni… it looks great for small maps.  The demo was not too bad.  But I had to have something that I could zoom out on and detail other areas.  But I am thinking of using it for detailed views of specific areas in my autorealm map.


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## ki11erDM (Apr 16, 2008)

Oh and I should note that this is the 2nd keyboard Pro Fantasy has cost me hehe.
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=211094

And before you say “you have rage issues” I have only done that 1 other time… when I love level 50 in EQ for the seemingly millionth time which i feel was very justified... /sigh


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## Emirikol (Apr 20, 2008)

I'm having trouble finding good TREES for use in my MAPTOOLS maps.  Anybody got a good source?

jh


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## TheAuldGrump (Apr 22, 2008)

ki11erDM said:
			
		

> Before you buy ether one of those try this:
> http://autorealm.sourceforge.net/index.php
> 
> I own CC3, after spending well over 30 hours of hard work and using ever tutorial I could find and spending days on the news groups I finally ripped my keyboard out of my computer and smashed the hell out of it against my wall.  That is how pi$$ed off I got at the darn program.  It is a HUGE challenge to do things that should be extremely simple.  If you are going to be a professional then learn it… if not I hope your anger management is better than mine.  Worst money I have ever spent.
> ...



*Blink* Considering that I was able to produce good maps within the first hour or so, I have difficulty understanding how it could challenge you this much. Just following the little tiny book that they include should produce better maps than AutoRealm uses as examples on their own site.

CC2 was a pain, and I was never happy with it. CC3? I really don't think it is much more complicated than AutoRealm, and has a lot of features that AutoRealm lacks. While free, AutoRealm really does not measure up in comparison. The sounds of your frustration do match well with mine in regards to CC2, but I suspect that you may not have given CC3 a fair chance. (To be honest, it matches up so well with my annoyance with CC2 that I suspect that it may have been CC2 that you were playing with. I got good results out of CC2, but only after weeks of playing around with it, cussing at it, and then ignoring it for a few days before trying again. And again....) 

I would say that CC3 is both powerful and useful, while AutoRealm is merely useful. Not bad - pretty easy to use, and the price really cannot be beat, but the results look amateurish. It does not have much power. Given a choice between AutoRealm and a piece of paper and some drawing tools I would have to make a choice based on my needs of the moment. For the most part I would go with paper and pen. AutoRealm is faster, and a heck of a lot easier to edit, but the final result would be similar.






Sorry, just does not compare.

*EDIT* One feature that AutoRealm has that CC3 lacks is a rosette button. I liked that feature enough that back when I was using Fractal Mapper more I would do my background in AR, then import it to FM7. This is, in my jaundiced opinion, the best feature of AR.

And, after mentioning all this, the mapper that I use most is still DungeonCrafter - a very simple, not all that powerful at all, tile based mapper. Most of my maps are not done to 25mm scale, and I have a wide selection of tiles to work with.

The Auld Grump


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## ki11erDM (Apr 22, 2008)

It probably has something to do with me going back and forth between the two with many weeks off in the mean time.  I just want a simple intuitive interface with lots of nice art to add to my (world) maps.  And none of the products out there are that.  Maybe I should look to see if I can import the art elements into AutoREALM but I have a feeling that is not going to happen.  Hehe

But there is no doubt that CC3 makes really nice maps and if you are going to sell your map to someone that is the software to use.


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## TheAuldGrump (Apr 23, 2008)

ki11erDM said:
			
		

> It probably has something to do with me going back and forth between the two with many weeks off in the mean time.  I just want a simple intuitive interface with lots of nice art to add to my (world) maps.  And none of the products out there are that.  Maybe I should look to see if I can import the art elements into AutoREALM but I have a feeling that is not going to happen.  Hehe
> 
> But there is no doubt that CC3 makes really nice maps and if you are going to sell your map to someone that is the software to use.



It occurred to me afterwards that playing with mapping programs is something that I do for fun - what you found frustrating may have been part of my enjoyment. And, as with so many things, if you enjoy doing something then you are more likely to like what you end up with. Frustration can beget frustration. While I do not make maps for publication I do make them to hang on my wall and look pretty. 

That I enjoy map programs does speak volumes about how user unfriendly CC2 was - even I did not enjoy playing with it. I did not do much more than take a peek at CC2 Pro - I gather that some of the problems I had with CC2 got addressed.

Also, I was not going from AutoRealm to CC3 - I went from AutoRealm (and a host of others) to Fractal Mapper (6, 7, and even 8, even though I already had CC3... like I said, I enjoy mapping programs).

Fractal Mapper might be a good compromise between our extremes - a decent program, with a good range of both features and graphic elements. TheFool1972 (Ancient Awakenings) on these forums made a nice set of tools for making towns in FM7 that more than doubled my use of the program.

The Auld Grump


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## FoolishFrost (Apr 23, 2008)

TheAuldGrump said:
			
		

> Fractal Mapper might be a good compromise between our extremes - a decent program, with a good range of both features and graphic elements. TheFool1972 (Ancient Awakenings) on these forums made a nice set of tools for making towns in FM7 that more than doubled my use of the program.
> 
> The Auld Grump





You might want to find a place to re-release that old set of tools, Auld!  I honestly have been out of RPGs for the last couple of years, and the old system died, along with the copy of that toolkit.

Honestly, I'm glad people got use out of it.  I made those tools especially for making the Valley of Frozen Tears maps, and they saved me more time making a few maps than they lost me making them, really.

Anyway, AA's mostly shutdown now.  We just dumped our line of books down to $0.10 each, and plan on just setting them up for free someplace if they decide to hold them.  We've moved on like a lot of people to virtual development.  

They call me Foolish Frost now.

Anyway, have fun, whatever you do!


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## Aloïsius (Aug 12, 2009)

I think I know why those programs are so damn annoying : they want to do too much different things. 

A world map is not a cities map is not a dungeon map, and yet those programs try to do all that. 

I would rather have many specific programs, each tailored to its use, than those bloated CAD derived things.

1) a simple one for drawing regional/worl map. You just need to define landmasses (or more precisely, coastlines, because all of them should not be fractal...), rivers and terrain type (eg : this area is forest, this area is desert, this area is jungle, this are is mountain...), plus a few symbols for cities and other special sites. You don't need to have the bazillions tools/menus/buttons that are cramped on the CC3 UI to make that !
If you want to put advanced options, the ability to choose between "plane" cartography and "spherical" cartography would be nice. 


2) A simple program to make city plans. There is no need to integrate it within the worldmapper ! And above all, no need to mix their UI so as to create a huge confusing stuff. Just a few options : size, type of towns (medieval, western, modern, futuristic...), and the tools required to draw the main avenues, place landmarks (hill, rivers, cliff, temples, castel...).

3) same kindof  thing for dungeons.

Above all, what would be nice would be to have fantasy mapping oriented UI, and not CAD based ones. This would make the UI much more intuitive to casual cartographers, aka the vast majority of players.


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## fademaster (Feb 23, 2011)

*RPGplaneMapMaker*

Try this (it's for Photoshop CS3 or better version)

DM tips + Map Maker | RPGplane


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## Blastin (Feb 24, 2011)

Lol...seeing as the OP was from 2008...I'm not sure he's still looking


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## fademaster (Feb 25, 2011)

*I know*

Topics are read by all people who look for the same thing. So here's my answer again (because we started a new page). RPGplaneMapMaker


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## Jupp (Feb 26, 2011)

Having used both applications for quite some time I have to say that CC3 is superior to Dundjinni mainly for the sophisticated functions that you would normally find in a CAD program. The complexity of CC3 is much lower than it was with CC2 so I'd say that in terms of a learning curve it is not that far away from Dundjinni IF you want to achive the same things in both applications. CC3 has a quite powerful toolset and if you would want to have the same results in Dundjinni you will have to fudge around some of the limitations that Dundjinni has, which can cost alot of time.

I have to agree that the user created content surpasses the one of CC3 but fortunately you can rip all the content from the Dundjinni forums and plug it directly in to CC3. 

Obviously my vote goes to CC3. The only real hindrance is the high price of CC3 but if you are willing to make that step I think it's worth the investment.

Edit says: Even if the thread is that old. The question about which mapping tool is good or best resurfaces every few weeks. So in that regard we just saved another persons time on creating a new post asking this question


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## Andaran (Apr 15, 2012)

*map maker to create a land map?*

Since a long time I'm on my search for the right map maker. I stumbled over a lot of map makers and reduced the (probably) best map makers to:


campaign cartographer 3
fractal mapper 8.0
dundjinni
Unfortunately I'm still as confused as I was when I started my search. I really hope you guys can help me finding the best map maker _for me_.




Spoiler: short story why I need a map maker



Some years ago I started a D&D campaign in an own world and created a small map of the kingdom and its sourroundings. (crayons and paper for the win!) My plan was to start the campaign in that kingdom and to fill the world, main events, et cetera with playing time, exploration of my groups characters and so on. I ever had a plan of the world in my head so I drew one sheet of paper after sheet of paper. It all started with a DIN A4 sheet, nowadays that map is larger than DIN A1 size. (I guess in north america you have other sizes? DIN A4 = 8.27 × 11.69 inches and DIN A1 = 23.4 x 33.1 inches or 2x "ledger")
After years the paper is dirty and the adhesive tape on the map back is not very ornamental. ​  I tried a map maker 2 or 3 years ago but my map looked awful and all other stuff I found was too complicated for a casual mapper like me. Now I found that programs above.



What I need the map maker for:
I do not want to create dungeons or cities or floor tiles. I just need a map maker to re-draw my map, to expand that map and to print that map. (probably in a copy shop)
At last it should be a good looking map (like at the campaign cartographer gallery).

What is my skill level:
basement to first floor. 
I do not have much time to spend (sadly!) and I am _far_ away from beeing an professional grafics artist. I'm just a casual user. So I do not want learn that map maker program for hours and hours before I can start to re-draw my map. (okay I would spend some hours but not days..)

I ogle with the CC3, plus fractal terrains 3 and the fantasy overland addon but I'm not sure about the difficulty.

So the last question is for you guys:
what map maker would you advice me to buy?


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## TanisFrey (Apr 16, 2012)

I have been mapping a bit more old school.  In part because I have little artistic talent.  I have been using Hexographer, it allows you to use the only BECM hex style maps.  You can some features be hand drawn like rivers, roads, coastlines and political borders or you can have them snap to the hex corners.  If you just want a random map, it will do that and you then add in things like city/town/village/fortification locations.  It has options for DM only icons and you can embed child maps (zoom in for certain locations).  It even allows you to import a hand drawn (or real world) map for a base for your map.

I find it extremely useful because I have little drawing talent.  Everyone has a different abilities and this may be useful to others like myself or you just like the style.


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## Andaran (Apr 18, 2012)

TanisFrey said:


> I have been mapping a bit more old school.  In part because I have little artistic talent.  I have been using Hexographer, it allows you to use the only BECM hex style maps.  You can some features be hand drawn like rivers, roads, coastlines and political borders or you can have them snap to the hex corners.  If you just want a random map, it will do that and you then add in things like city/town/village/fortification locations.  It has options for DM only icons and you can embed child maps (zoom in for certain locations).  It even allows you to import a hand drawn (or real world) map for a base for your map.
> 
> I find it extremely useful because I have little drawing talent.  Everyone has a different abilities and this may be useful to others like myself or you just like the style.



Thanx TanisFrey!
First when I saw the Hexographer I was really sceptical. I had all that beautiful maps in mind. But yeah, this mapper is easy to use and it fits my needs totally. Great!


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## TanisFrey (Apr 18, 2012)

Andaran said:


> Thanx TanisFrey!
> First when I saw the Hexographer I was really sceptical. I had all that beautiful maps in mind. But yeah, this mapper is easy to use and it fits my needs totally. Great!



Not a problem.  One of the nice features is there is a free and a pay version.  The free version you must be online to use but can save the maps to your PC.  The pay version lets you use it any time and do things like create embedded child maps.  He also has Icons and other images so that you can do a city/building interior/dungeon maps.


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## gamerprinter (Apr 18, 2012)

First advice, join the Cartographers' Guild website, this is a site dedicated to the creation of maps for fiction, RPGs and other uses. Most if not all of the professional cartographers in the RPG industry are members there.

In that site are lists of all known mapping applications, costs, where to find them. Also on the site are tutorials for most of those mapping applications.

If you're looking for something simple to use - Hexographer is not bad.

If you don't mind CAD (I hate CAD) - CC3 is a good choice.

If you like stamping programs (I don't) - Dundjinni is a stamping program.

If you ask a pro cartographer what they use - most likely Photoshop, GIMP, Inkscape, Illustrator...

If you ask me, I'll say Xara Designer Pro 7 (which is what I use) which is a vector drawing program like Inkscape or Illustrator, but has very powerful beveling, transparency, works well with bitmap images, and I find to be the fastest to create effective maps.

Here's a link to my *Cartography thread* here on ENWorld - again all created using Xara software. Note there are also many illustrations, especially at the end of that thread, they too were created in Xara.

Join the Cartographers' Guild as your most important decision!


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