Hey OPers,
If you haven't read our last update post, or checked out the map markers interface lately, then it may be news to you that we released a new set of map markers under the set name "General". Since this was the first foray into map markers for Jynx001 and myself (admittedly he did most of the heavy lifting on this), we stayed fairly close to the established mold, but branching out is certainly something we're up for doing going forward.
That said, we're very interested in hearing from the community. What markers would you like to see next? How about in general?
A few of the concepts/sets we have in mind at the moment are:
There are some others, but hopefully this is enough to get peoples' minds going. So tell us what you'd like to see! We want to hear from you.
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Comments
Any and all of the above, plus I'd love to see some sci-fi options. Starport, asteroid field, black hole, sector capital, etc.
Great suggestions, WarChild! I have added them to the master list.
I'll second the sci-fi options, adding a space version of shipwreck to the mix.
Good one. It's on the list now, too. Thanks for the input!
Currently I am happy with the Std Dragon marker and use colour coding to denote different types of locations but all of the ideas above seem to me like good additions.
"I met a traveller from an antique land....."
CotM May 2016: Mysteria: set in Wolfgang Baur’s MIDGARD.
Previous CotM Aug 2012: Shimring: High Level Multiplanar Campaign
Inner Council Member
Is there a way to lock them down so players don't end up moving them around on accident? Also is there any plan for controls on who can edit map markers, I'm not sure most campaigns would even want players to be able to edit them?
These are not things that are in place currently, but I can certainly put the notion forth and see what can be done in this area.
- Kallak
I think the icons already up and the suggestions are great, but I'd like to see some "ruins" versions as well. Crumpled modern buildings, overgrown fantasy locations, or even destroyed ship/debris. I know that's a whole new subset, but it could really add to the feel for some map/location centered games.
Love all of the suggested icons, but I'd say that the focus needs to be on preventing the markers from being moved so easily. I'm not sure how everyone else feels but in my experience I move the map markers accidentally CONSTANTLY, especially on mobile, because merely clicking on them and dragging is enough to move them. Difficult not to click and drag on the icons when they are somewhat large on a mobile screen and they are all over the place when tapping and dragging is the means used to zoom the map in and out. Maybe a toggle option to lock them in place, located in their info screen when they are selected? That would prevent most of my issues.
GM of Rise of the Durnskald: Wrath of the Fallen Goddess - February 2016 CotM
GM of Core: The Ashes of Alcarna - April 2020 CotM
GM of Stream of Kairos
Need CSS Help? It may be covered here: Abersade's CSS Hub
I agree that this would be very helpful.
Another enhancement that I would like to see is to have an option to have some of the markers reduce to dots (rather than full markers) when zoomed out. Right now it is easy to have markers almost completely obscuring your map. Perhaps even a selector that allows filtering of markers by icon and/or color, with the filtered items showing as dots.
Any word on new icons? Even some of the basic fantasy ones would be great. I didn't realize how much it would throw me off not to have just a town or an anvil icon.
Hey, all! Yes, I am still working on map markers -- we just released the Sci-Fi/Space set inspired by suggestions from @WarChild and @Notsonoble. Eventually, there will be more options for those, but we're trying to get the basics covered before we go crazy with 20 different ships and flying spaghetti monsters. It took a while to figure out what the Google Maps program needed (I don't have access to the site code and it was all implemented originally by the previous-previous-previous development folks who have retired to a secret island somewhere in the Pacific where we can't bother them with questions like WHY!?!?!?).
The goal is to get some markers out once a month in a particular theme, and whenever you all suggest one, I add it to our master list, so keep on suggesting. If you have picture references you want, feel free to post those, too. Inspiration is always helpful.
I'm currently working on "Disasters" which includes things like Biohazard, Meteor, Tornado, Volcano, and a handful of others if there's time (and if the map program doesn't chew them up too badly). @conan_lybarian has suggested assorted ruins, which are now their own category, and I have Village on my "Overworld Map" set list and Anvil on my "Fantasy Town" list -- so I will prioritize those as soon as time becomes available.
I am with you on the idea of locking down the markers so only GM's can move them. It's on the master to-do list for the Dev's (I'm not a developer, just graphics and blog articles and comics). From what I understand, it's a delicate program set up in the Long, Long-Ago by The Ancient Ones who did not care so much for the niceties of documentation, so the specialist that is taking care of all of our cool features has to do some forensic investigation and testing before that can be achieved. He's really good at what he does though, so I'm confident it will get implemented eventually. And we will let you know as soon as we are informed.
Thanks for the support, everybody! There's lots of cool new stuff in the works this year. (I'm sworn to secrecy with a 9th Level Spell!) Keep your digital ears to the cyber-ground for more news here and on all our assorted social media pages!
Thanks for the update! Definitely excited to start updating the campaign map with some of these- my players will be super surprised
I'm excited to see what's in the works.
GM of Rise of the Durnskald: Wrath of the Fallen Goddess - February 2016 CotM
GM of Core: The Ashes of Alcarna - April 2020 CotM
GM of Stream of Kairos
Need CSS Help? It may be covered here: Abersade's CSS Hub
I'd love to see Kaiju added to the Disasters group... :-)
Cool suggestion, @dragondreams - Kaiju is now on the idea list for map markers. Thanks!
Monsters could be cool. To represent lairs and threats. Abstract fluffy wings, demon wings, eyeball, tentacles, clawed hands.
Runes for different classic fantasy races. Something fancy for elven, viking-ish for dwarven, etc. These would be hard to design.
Also the ability to just add text labels although that might be really hard idk
Nice! I've added these to the feature request list.
Obsidian Portal Developer
Some classic heraldic style devices would be nice too - lion, fleur de lys, rose, unicorn, bear, wyvern, fish, blood drop, gauntlet
Transport - airship, naval ship, train, portal, horse, caravan train
Great suggestions @jodie
Just trying to help out.
The most awesome thing would be the ability to upload your own little png, but I'm guessing google maps aren't simple
I think the map markers are actually "svg" files, not "png" files. But I haven't dug into that part of the code much yet, so I can't say if they MUST be "svg" for some technical reason, or if "png" could work. I would guess that there is a technical reason, otherwise, they probably would have gone with pngs to start with. In any case, I've added the request to the list. Thanks!
Obsidian Portal Developer
If they are restricted to svg files, that is an inconvenience, but probably not a huge problem. There do appear to be free SVG converters online
Just having the ability to upload our own markers would add flexibility
Great points!
Obsidian Portal Developer