User blog:Miguelhdzb25/Miguel's (Kind of) Comprehensive Guide on Mapping

Hello mate, welcome to my sexy and comprehensive guide. I have had this in mind for almost a month now, and finally I have the opportunity to make this.

Now you may see Ion's new video and may think, "heheh miguel ur fokin copiier xdxxxd :)))". I think I have said I have had this in mind for a month. But, you may also think, "ur liar :)". I may be, I may not be. The thing is that I want to make clear that this document is not for competing with Ion's Mapping Tips. In the other hand, I am making it so if he ever runs out of ideas for his tips, he can look here.

Also, I want to state that most of the statements I will make here are from my point of view, so if you think that my opinion is wrong, you could tell me that without insults and I could maybe change my mind.

Let's begin, shall we?

What you will see
There are a lot things in this guide. There are things such as ways to end your series, advantages and disadvantages of each type of series (such as AFoE, or AFoAsia).

What you will not see
As this guide will be focused in how to do a great plot, you will not see things such as how to make a war or things like that. You may find a little bit of sparce knowledge about that, but, as I have said previously, there is no main focus on that.

Choosing a map
Choosing a map may not be an easy task, or at least for me. When I am trying to start a new series, it is usual that I take at least 1 day on choosing a map. And why is that? Well, there are too many good maps out there, and let me tell you, some are quite useless (such as pre-textured maps) or other ones may be beautiful, very detailed maps. It is quite easy to identify a decent map from a ugly map. Now, the criteria should be as following:

How to identify a good map
]] Also it is really important to find a map that you feel its not that big or that small. Maps that are too small will get boring after 10-15 episodes. And big maps will not be readable unless you do some kind of black magic.
 * It does not have textures already in it.
 * It is clean. For identifying a clean map, the idea is to check on the borders. Let's take Ethan's old maps (sorry Ethan). If you look at them, you will see that some borders "penetrate" the other country. Maps should not be like that.[[File:57.png|thumb|400px|How maps are not clean
 * Not .jpg.

Also it is VERY IMPORTANT to see if the map fits the screen correctly. I mean with the screen ratio you set in Movie Maker, like 4:3 or 16:9. If their proportion is different, black bars will appear when editing the video.

Making a custom map
If you can't find the map you're looking for, the best thing you can do is to make it yourself. For making that I suggest you use the Victoria 2 Blank Map with provinces as a base so you can get decent, "accurate" borders.

Choosing a type of series
You may think that by choosing a map you already have your series defined, right? Well, kind of... BUT, it is better to think about the advantages and disadvantages of each type of series there is, so you can do a proper series without regreting about making it halfway.

Advantages and Disadvantages
Ok, now that we have that cleared we may now start with the nice part: Starting your plot.

Starting your plot
Starting your plot may be easy for mappers that do not give a big importance to the story. But for the others, it may not be as easy.

For me, a plot in mapping always needs a "triggering" point. "Triggering" points would be something a country did and with that everything would be screwed for everyone. More in detail, it would be something that triggers all the change you are going to see in a series. In Alternate History series they will not be really needed for a while, until you reach the modern age (21st century and such). But for  Alternate Futures, this "triggering" points will ALWAYS be needed very soon in the series, and if you can, do it in the first episode.

Here's a list of the "triggering" points I can think of:

Some triggering points
You may think of more, but I think these ones are quite good. A triggering point must always make people realize that the future you're exposing in your series is different than ours, as war will be known as the only answer for a time, and agressive and new nations will arise from different places, and they may be good or bad... Let's talk about giving a country a personality.
 * Brexit.
 * EU collapsing.
 * Russia and their friends collapsing.
 * USA collapsing.
 * Aliens.
 * Conflict in Ukraine leads to a World War.
 * Nuclear War that does not kill everyone.

"Good" and "Bad" countries
For me, the idea of good and bad people does not exist. And that idea of good and bad countries should be eradicated.

What does evil mean? profoundly immoral and malevolent.

And what's malevolent? ''having or showing a wish to do evil to others. ''But... Do you think that a country would like to be evil? No, of course not. If you still feel "evil" countries are still good, read the next.

A great example are movies. And superhero movies are the best example of the best possible examples. Superhero movies always portrait an evil guy who wants to kill everybody and take over the world, bla, bla, bla.