My Map Making Choice is Made

In the beginning of July I wrote about getting into map making and using the different software that was available to me. I had 2 pieces of software AutoRealm and Campaign Cartographer 2 pro. Well it's been some time and I'm going to be using Campaign Cartographer 2 pro for my map making Choices. I have almost a complete product line mostly to my cheapskate buying tactic of hitting up the local hobby shop and Warehouse 23 since they're on clearance to make room for Campaign Cartographer 3.

Choosing Champaign Cartographer was pretty easy after I worked my way through the first tutorial in the Complete book. I found the tutorial to be nicely written and easy to follow. OK so not really. I found that emailing customer service got me answers to my stupid questions about why this or that didn't work like they said in the PDF. For example my contour lines would disappear. Quick question and answer session with some one at ProFantasy and I got contour lines that stick.

This compares favorably over AutoRealm. Since AutoRealm is free software the same kind of tutorial is handled with a website and a mailing list. I learned one thing from this experience with free software. I can use a free software equivalent to any software I know how to use. If I don't know how to use the software I'm going to need a manual and real support.I was kinda lost and intimidated by the website. I continue to follow the mailing list hoping someday I catch up.

Since I got into the learning carve I have to point out that Campaign Cartographer doesn't really have a manual but it does have a whole lot of good tutorials. All the manuals are written the same way. I even went searching for a FastCAD manaul since that is the system underlying Campaign Cartographer thinking surely they'd have something for a down load. No dice there for me. I also looked at Amazon.com for a for dummies book or a teach your self in 24 hours. Nope they'd have none of that either. I'm actually contemplating creating a blog on Campaign Cartographer so I could write the manual I'd love to have. I bought the Tome of Ultimate Mapping. Guess what it has in it? More tutorials but kinda is like a manual in that you can jump for section to section and has a nice lay out.

I actually want CC3 for Christmas I think I can get alot of use out of this software. I have already mapped my Han for my Sengoku game. Yea coming soon the 6 Demon Blades followed by the revenge of the 6 Demon Blades.