I've finally started to map out my NaNoWriMo story (literally!)

[capri0mni]

(click to enlarge)

(This is just the beginning, I intend (some way or other) fill in the Entire Map)

As I was doing this, I was reminded of something I learned through being raised by a liberal, politically active, Environmentalist (In an era when Mainstream Culture viewed Environmentalists as close cousins to terrorists, because they agitated against the Status Quo and Progress):

That Culture can never be seperated from Environment.

I mean, just by deciding on a specific landscape for my story, and a smaller section of that landscape for my protagonist's place of origin, and looking closely at that landscape, I've realized:

• The inhabitants of the smaller trading city (in the southwest corner of "Chapter One Box" would see my protagonist as a yokel.


• The inhabitants of the International trading city (in "Chapter Two Box") would look at him like an alien from another planet.

The simple topography of the place can tell you which land is likely to be fertile, which has easy access to transport for trade, etc. All of these things determine where a city is likely to be located, and what its culture is.

Even after the citizens are generations removed from being directly depenant on the natural environment, the cultural biases and assumptions continue.

That's another niggle I have with this mapgen program: by default, it generates thirty cities for every map created (With predetermined Tolkein-ish names), and it looks like they're generated with the same random alogarhythm.

So cities are scattered more or less evenly spaced, willy-nilly whether they are in the mountains or planes, or any place a road might conceivibly be built...

So, in my tweaking, I set the number of cities to zero... 'cause I just don't need the brain contamination.