Polarian Shipwreck House Map

It's been almost two years since I did my Amber Estate Map. The Polarian Explorer's Bundle inspired a second one. After redeeming the bundle, I immediately fell in love with almost every aspect of it. The house itself is not quite as spectacular as some of the original bundle homes, but I intially hadn't been so lost in my own house since the Pyramid of the Lost Horizon (that's a good thing).

Mapping a Shipwreck

I decided that I wanted to create a map for the Polarian Shipwreck. Pirate101 homes come with their own maps, but Wizard101 homes never have, though some could use them. For those who haven't read about the process on my previous map, I'll recap it briefly here.

These maps are designed as vector artwork, which means that the original versions can be scaled up or down infinitely without any loss of quality since they're just lines and curves instead of pixels filled with color. Everything is made up of these points. It can get surprisingly detailed for how simple the map it.

Leading with Lines

Wizard101 has a couple of defining styles in creating these maps. They generally keep it fairly basic, and always use their doodle style, though everything is drawn to scale on the map part because it has to actually function with where you run around. They use the brown outlines with a thicker outline surrounding the overall area. (They are distinct from Pirate in this way, also. Pirate uses the heavier outline around the area in which you can walk.)

After the outline is finished and refined, the color is added in. If you notice on the finished map, it doesn't just lay on top of the parchment, but also has the texture on top of it.

Bonus Doodles

Typically I then add the little doodles surrounding the image, which was probably the toughest part of this map, and there are already some things I'd change if I did it over. One of the things Wizard has done on their maps is the soft-edged brushes for skies and water, so I tried that out with the auroras in the background, which I feel are a defining part of the house. I also used other elements of the bundle, including the Battle Narwhal mount and the Proper Penguin pet. My final addition was the dog who crashed into the island and has taken refuge in a cave under your home, offering you a few free items from his crates each day.

To give you an idea of what it might look like in-game, I did a quick composition of the map with the game elements added, such as the Spiral door icon and the player arrow. 

What do you think?

Thanks for reading and see you in the Spiral!