User:Corgrind/MyMaps

It seems I found some ardor composing quest maps.

I generally use the symbol set U:Mjoll indroduced in his time with some modifications. Beginning May 2022 I use a dedicated symbol for Resurrection Shrines. I no longer rely on screenshots for the base map but scrap it from the DDO client's resources. My choice to work with is Photoshop Elements.

Quick list of my steps:
 * Find the correct map file(s) in the client resources
 * Run the quest and create screenshots of interesting locations.
 * If the minimap isn't sufficient use the map window (note that the location arrow blinks before getting permanent)
 * For things which tend to have random locations (collectables) the quest must be run several times
 * When planning to create a new quest page I also have a look on base XP objectives and bonus XP margins
 * Save map in Photoshop format
 * If the position of an icon is easily determined I just copy the needed icon from my resource file (see below) to the map creating a new layer
 * On trickier situations I copy the part of a screent shot in "brighter light" mode as reference and delete it after use
 * all icons are placed the graph is reduced to one layer
 * On a new layer all necessary lines for the legend are collected, completed and aligned.

Important information: The maps are hand painted 2D graphics. At the moment they are displayed 1:1 in DDO (my resolution 2560x1440) so screenshots match the maps from the resources. Because map file and 3D model are 2 different things your location may look skewed off. Also maps may be outright wrong (see The Icemount Curse for example)

So this is what I have done so far: