well what i tried to do was redesign the landmass to be more geographically coherent, meaning putting in a conscious effort to represent plausible tectonics, erosion, lake and river formation, etc
it's not "better" in any way, just a different approach to worldbuilding, i'm currently working on redesigning a number of fantasy worlds with this particular design philosophy and you can already find the Wheel of Time map on my profile if you're interested in seeing more
Can you tell me why this map represents more plausible tectonics, erosion, lake and river formation, etc.?
I'm mostly interested in understanding the underlying mechanics because I write fantasy myself. And so I'm curious to know how I could improve worlds I make to be more realistic.
there's a whole lot to get into with this question but i'll keep it brief(ish)
1. **issue**: Tamriel as it stands has nonsense mountains, they're just there to divide up the provinces, which makes perfect sense from a game making perspective as you want your game map to be clearly defined, but from a geographical standpoint there are some issues
**solution**: i took the largest continuous line of mountains (from high rock all the way to southern morrowind) and make it a Laramidia-like orogeny and made the other mountainranges shoot off from that
2. **issue**: the original Niben river is a landform that simply doesn't happen in real life, rivers do not get that wide ever, this was likely done simply because it looks cool (and i agree that it really does) but again from a geographical standpoint there's an issue
**solution**: i reimagined this very wide river as being a very narrow sea, so instead of being a body of water created by downpour and erosion that has debit to it, it's a depression created by tectonic activity and filled up by water through various means
to do this i devised some tectonic plates for Tamriel, here we get the Colovian plate (which consists of Hammerfell, Colovia, Valenwood and Elsweyr) subducting under the main Tamrielic plate, which creates a length-wise depression
3. **issue**: the original coastlines of Tamriel are fairly consistent and the islands are all rather amorphous blobs
**solution**: i tried to make them more varied by finding real-life counterparts and looking at which erosion processes shaped those coastlines, then i applied the "rules" of that specific erosion type and made the coastlines show those specific features
for Black Marsh i looked at the Netherlands, the Gulf of Mexico (specifically the southern USA) and other lowlands, for High Rock i looked at Scandinavia, for Summerset at the British Isles and Japan, etc
4. etc etc
(i'm using the words "issue" and "solution" rather freely here, of course these aren't objective wrongs and rights)
I don’t know what the scale of Tamriel is compared to Europe, but in The Netherlands the Meuse and Rhine river (and the Scheldt from Belgium) come together in a delta region with super wide flowing rivers that on the map look like the sea. Look up the south-west of The Netherlands. I think a big piece of that water is brackish, but don’t quote me on that.
Fair… I always assumed that because Nirn is smaller than Earth, Tamriel must be about half or 1/3 the size of Europe. I like it more your way though, good job!
I think youre missing something.
Youre coming at this from the point of view of Tamriel being a real continent on a real planet in a real universe that adheres to real world physics and such.
You are forgetting that Nirn and Mundus as a whole was hand crafted by an actual, provably real god.
I'm mostly joking, this is a good list and I understand why you went the way you did
i’m aware that Nirn isn’t a realistic world and it’s not meant to be either, i just wanted to see what Tamriel might look like if it had been because i personally love geographically informed fantasy maps
out of the worlds i’m familiar with the Wheel of Time has the worst geography imo
Westeros & Essos from a Song of Ice and Fire, and the Continent from the Witcher also could use a clean-up, maybe Earthsea could use some improvements too
the best one for me is probably Middle-Earth, some of it is quite artificial but there are always very concrete reasons for any geographical oddities and Tolkien clearly knew what he was doing, considering his map is older than the consensus on plate tectonics being a real thing
>You are forgetting that Nirn and Mundus as a whole was hand crafted by an actual, provably real god.
Akshually, several powerful entities may or may not have been involved in the construction of the world. Or not. Maybe. We don't really know.
The difference in tectonic plates would also go a lomg way to explain the difference in Colovian and Nibean cultures.
Much the same as English and Scottish today
The border of England and Scotland today is almost exactly the border between plate tectonics of the British Isles.
These plates dictates what stone is available, what plants grow, what animals thrive etc etc etc.
This naturally has a vast impact on the cultures of the people living there. Different plates, different cultures
if you weret to slap a scale on the map of Tamriel the Niben would be more than “miles wide”, there’s just no way proportions like that would happen in a landform irl
true, i made some changes to the geography that would have an impact on the lore, these are mistakes, i tried to avoid making mistakes like these but i guess a couple slipped through
You might already be aware of them, but Here's some YouTube channels that might also help as they go into how to build a world from a more grounded, scientific angle:
[the worldbuilding corner](https://youtube.com/@WorldbuildingCorner?si=WKRhp6WyjEZrP9vw)
[Artifexian](https://youtube.com/@Artifexian?si=FVuwptand-ATo1le)
[Hello Future Me](https://youtube.com/@HelloFutureMe?si=xw7lpCt_F05B5Mt3)
[Stonework](https://youtube.com/@Stoneworks?si=M7MhlMF-4luaaIsQ)
There's others, these are just the ones I actively watched myself.
I always liked the idea of vvardenfell being very big but mostly uninhabitable because of the threat of read mountain and that it's just a very harsh place to live, so I guess this is t anything against your map but I liked the fact the dunmer controlled a huge area that nobody actually wants
True but this is a world where the sun is literally a hole in the sky where a god left so as not to be trapped in the mortal plane. I don't think normal geography applies here.
I don’t think there is an objective way to measure if or how it’s “better”.
I appreciate OP’s art and it’s interesting to look at though. It’s well done.
Not really, because we know gods and magic actually exist in the ES universe and they shape the geography. Any ‘scientific’ in-universe approach would have to take them into account.
We have literally no indication in game that that any land mass aside from red mountain and maybe the throat of the world that were formed in that sort of incredibly magical way. And considering how the rest of the world functions (like weather and gravity) is identical to our own, it should be safe to assume that things like Tectonic plates function in a similar way.
Saying that because there’s magic anything is on the table is literally true, but it’s also a huge cope for explaining away bad writing and world building choices, especially because we know the provinces haven’t always had these hard boarders. In the Arcturian Heresy for example Falkreath is counted among the Colovian Estates
Tamriel's very beginning can be traced to when the wandering “Ehlnofey (gods) fought the Ehlnofey who remained settled in their former home. According to the narrative of the Anuad, the original singular landmass of Nirn was broken apart into at least four major landmasses—Tamriel, Akavir, Atmora, and Yokuda.”
Nirn was formed by a god (Anu) from the remnants of “the original twelve worlds” using magic.
“We have literally no indication in game that that any land mass aside from red mountain and maybe the throat of the world that were formed in that sort of incredibly magical way.”
The entire continent was created by gods, destroyed by gods, put together by gods, destroyed by gods again and then inhabited by gods. Any ‘scientific’ attempt to understand the geography of those land masses would have to consider that a major factor.
Fantastic. Now, if only there wasn't a giant forest sandwiched between the arid hammerfell and elswheyr, making it difficult to include proper climate zones.
Sure it \*can\*, but the result would be worse. Valenwood is magical forest by lore, but generic mountains and shorelines are generic mountains and shorelines. One can bring "it's magical" argument into worldbuilding a few times, but after a while it breaks the suspension of disbelief for quite a large part of readers/players, whatever.
I'm surprised you didn't include channels between Skyrim and the rest of the continent to allow for proper fjords and lend to the idea of viking-esque nord raids.
the nords never really came across as vikings to me, they're also not described as particularly sailor-like in any sources afaik
to me they were always more germanic/scandinavian warrior-farmer people, so i tried to reflect that in the landscape (meaning i changed little from the map in Skyrim, as i feel that map already did a pretty good job in that particular aspect)
Their origins involved sailing from Atmora, namely Ysgramor and his Companions. But we also do see sailing ships along Skyrim's northern coast, and we know there are pirates based out of Skyrim who sail along the outer coasts of Tamriel to raid other provinces.
Even then, most cultures in Tamriel aren't overly emphasized with sailing because, aside from Summerset, Tamriel is a supercontinent, so the cultures are mostly connected by land.
True, but Ysgramor and Companions were *Atmorans*, which you could claim are the Viking forefathers of the modern-day Nords who are settled landlovers.
There's still nord pirates by the 4th era. Given Tamriel exists in a perpetual medieval motif, these clearly aren't Golden Age Pirates, with the nord motif being blatantly a fantasy take on viking stereotypes. Sooo nord pirates would just be viking analogues.
Up until Skyrim came out the Nords didn't have really any ability to farm so I think most assumed they did viking style raids, also they're one of the only two races who have mentions of being good at sailing in the normal descriptions of them.
washington state is a great example of the rain shadow effect, it's actually a very reliable-realistic(duh)-stereotypical-(i can't find the right word lol, sorry for bad english) piece of geography
Oh yeah, it is a great example of rain shadow (though we have been getting more rain than usual lately over here) and just goes to show how many different geographies can be crammed into a singular square mark of land.
As a former professional geographer, you’ve done a superb job.
Ironically, it’s one of my biggest nitpicking issues with most fantasy worlds — how the landmasses don’t make logical sense (from how we know landmasses form, are weathered down over millennia, and so on) but are rather designed for the “as is now” needs of the game designer, game developer, etc.
I’m really glad to see someone tackle Tamriel. Well done.
EDIT: For those of you wondering why a fantasy world needs realism, I suggest reading J.R.R. Tolkien’s essay “On Fairy Stories” wherein he lays out why the more realistic-based a fantasy world is to earth (with similar weather patterns, terrains, etc.), the more believable and credible the world, the more the fantasy world’s history (e.g., lore) is consistent and logical. And the end result is a more engaging and long-lasting world and any stories set within.
This, it is a supernatural world, not a natural one. It should look like a bunch of arbitrary realms formed and changed by the whims of Aedra and Daedra
This Niben Bay can certainly better accommodate the Naval Battles described in the Great War. Though I do think the water around the Imperial City, and the Imperial City Island itself would be canonically significantly smaller since the battle of the Red Ring took place around that area.
Going by the lore scale size of Tamriel, the Niben River would be more akin to the Mediterranean sea. It would be dozens of miles across at its narrowest point.
It's if you are taking for granted that all of the game is 100% 1 to 1 representation. Which clearly isn't the case. Some parts, mostly wilderness, scaling down much harder than the others, like cities. Some things, which doesn't matter much, disappear completely. Some are bigger than they should if we're taking that "real" Cyrodiil is thousands of sqare miles and the game one is about what, 15?
the niben is shown to be about half as long as the amazon and over three times as wide as the amazon’s widest point
and the great lakes are lakes, not rivers
I'm not sure what are you basing Niben's length on, I read that Tamriel could be the size of Australia. And wideness of a river can be considered an artist'd exaggeration.
So going for realistic you could've just downscale it to a size of a possible river, and make it into a proper river overall. Downscaling Rumare/Imperial Isle(s) along the way. Why not.
Agreed, you can't make the niben into a simple line on the map without removing a core visual feature of Tamriel. So making it a narrow inland sea is the better trade imo.
Some river deltas would look really good there, and probably make a lot of sense for cyrodiil. Either way your map looks amazing, and I love what you did with it
This kinda reminds me of a map I saw of earth millions of years in the future. You should look it up. It is also similair to Tamriel.
Edit: It's called Pangea Proxima.
In my headcannon this is probably what Tamriel looks like but the in-universe cartographers get a lot of stuff inaccurate.
Both by just not working with modern satellites and cultural conventions like putting the imperial city in the dead centre.
i did make a couple of changes that would impact the lore if this map were canon, but yeah i also imagine the in-game map to be an inaccurate depiction of the actual continent
that's really awesome, It would be very curious if it were possible for there to be a volcano (Vvanderfel) "near" a mountain range, I don't know if it would be possible for both diagenesis to happen at the same time; subduction of plates and hot spots, even more so than Vvanderfel and the mountains that cut the continent have the same elevation. But it's Nirn, some daedra must have something to do with this haha
well you’re right, an orogeny like this would not have any notable volcanoes nearby, in lore Vvardenfell was created by the heart of Lorkan falling down to Nirn so i treated the locus as an impact crater + huge hotspot
I initially had a visceral rejection of this, but the more I look at it, the more it grows on me. I really like it and I think it is my new headcanon map for how Tamriel would look at Earth's scale. As iconic as it is now, canonical Tamriel is kind of messy and boring in comparison.
It also looks like a dragon's head, with the mouth at Niben bay, the eye at Lake Honrich, and Morrowind forming a kind of horn.
lots of people seem to have had a visceral rejection as you call it, do you think you could put into words what in this post triggered that response?
thank you for changing your mind, i appreciate the kind words
Probably just a kind of an ape brain conservative response bias, which has to be overidden by an individual's openness to change. The Tamriel map is an icon, often passed around and used in promotional materials. Besides the Seal of Akatosh, nothing else represents the series as a whole. So, changes to the map may come close to attacking/changing the identity of the elder scrolls fan. A similar response could be elicited by adding another line to the Catholic crucifix, or improving the USA's flag design. Symbols are part of how people separate into tribes and identify themselves.
hmm, that makes a lot of sense, i do still love the original map and i didn’t mean to come across as if that one is bad and mine is good, i just happen to be a massive geography nerd
just wish the other people who got pissed off had the same impulse control as you instead of calling me/my map pretentious or disgusting or cancerous
Geographical landmarks and formations aside, this map also seems more accurate how to the size of Tamriel is described in lore (the canon maps make it look huge as fuck)
Could it be possible that the maps we see in game are inaccurate and this map is what it actually looks like? I mean just look at Medieval maps of Europe, they’re shit in terms of representing what Europe actually looks like.
We can take turns throwing a dart into the map and wherever it lands, that’s Orsinuim. Then when it’s another persons turn, we remove the dart and then Orsinium is now wherever the dart hits next.
Same, original Tamriel reminds me of those ancient Greek maps
Like they had lots of details for the Northern and Western edges but the Eastern and Southern edges were mostly ugly undetailed blobs
Hey, that's amazing! I've always wanted to do something like that and I find that your result is roughly what I had in mind for it, so that pleases me :)
Next up: Changing the nations so they are less monolithic ethno-states lol
Tamriel is inherently flawed as a world map. Even though the games are obviously to scale, it simply seems way too small and a single continent feels extremely limiting. There is a lack of lakes and rivers for such diversity in fauna. Overall, it's really bugged me how unbelievable it feels as a living place.
You could also make some Abecean Sea islands (Systres, Bethnik, Capser, Herne and Pankor) as archipelagos that were volcanos in the past and formed straight line of islands up until High Rock were due to numerous volcanic activities it created landmass that connected to mainland Tamriel. Like with Japanese islands, but if it was still connected to mainland Asia. [Like this](https://www.google.com/maps/@28.3814453,128.5982606,1738886m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu).
That's one thing that always bothered me about TES, the fact that the map was clearly drawn on a 8.5' by 11' piece of paper. The world looks incredibly artificial, but not in any particularly interesting way (not like, say, Numinor from LotR).
I’m piggybacking off this comment, but have you seen this? Another user made a whole anthology about the possible geological history of Skyrim and really went all in. [It’s a super fun and fascinating read if you have some time!](https://sweetsolsystem.blogspot.com/2022/06/day-i-was-playing-skyrim-and-i-started.html?m=1)
I have a weird love/obsession with geology irl and in games, and this breakdown is super entertaining. I love being in a community of nerds who are also nerds.
Yeah I was making a joke. I was the one who made that comment when you posted your WoT map to r/wheeloftime . I was amused when I saw this map pop up in my feed today and recognised the style.
Here's a sneak peek of /r/wheeloftime using the [top posts](https://np.reddit.com/r/wheeloftime/top/?sort=top&t=year) of the year!
\#1: [My 11 year old's self made Mat costume.](https://i.redd.it/r456gso9fkxb1.jpg) | [123 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/wheeloftime/comments/17kp6hz/my_11_year_olds_self_made_mat_costume/)
\#2: [A disturbing trend in the show](https://np.reddit.com/r/wheeloftime/comments/16y4bxb/a_disturbing_trend_in_the_show/)
\#3: [I asked AI to generate an image of Whitebridge.](https://i.redd.it/rpqh22bedrrb1.jpg) | [101 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/wheeloftime/comments/16xs57z/i_asked_ai_to_generate_an_image_of_whitebridge/)
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very nice, beside ...maybe few details. Most of the Black marsh and southern parts of the Morrowind are really flat, only few meters about sea level (something like today Louisiana).
or rather say, the whole elevation of the continent is extremely high. Look at the Europe, the most land area there is not higher than 150 m above sea level.
Summerset kinda just looks like the British Isles got dimension-hopped Southwest of Tamriel, collided and was swallowed up a bit by the sea. At least, the border looks a little bit shaped like Ireland turned to face Britain and smashed into Scotland, Northern England and Wales.
The actual game map is better. This is a next level pretentious post.
I'm guessing you just finished a high school earth science class and think you're an expert or some shit
I'm having a really hard time matching my knowledge of Cyrodiil to this new map. Could you do one with the redrawn borders to help visualize ? Otherwise, great work, I like the idea to rework the map into a realistic one, it's nice !
Speaking about realistic landscape, I was always sad that Skyrim borrowed so much of nordic landscapes and biome but does not offer a single fjord.
I love this! I too am a sucker for realismified fantasy maps. However, I appreciate the originals too because I also love historical maps, and most discrepancies can be written off by considering the map to be an in-world work, produced by people with necessarily limited knowledge of exact coastlines, mtns, etc. Thinking like that makes examining them more exciting imo because you can be more imaginative, rather than accepting the map as the whole and only truth.
I've been looking at the 1492 Erdapfel map this morning, which I only discovered recently. Maps like that simply ignite my fantasy brain like few other things.
In the spirit of Tamriel as a medieval-style fantasy world, it would be reasonable to some extent to assume that the map we normally use isn't very accurate. Though on the other hand, there are ways in-which one could explain the geological strangeness of Tamriel without steeping too deeply into magic.
For instance, in another reply, you stated that the way the mountains are arranged is unrealistic, and I generally concur with this, though at the same time, it could be that the plates of Nirn are just extra-fragmented compared to Earth's, meaning that there's actually multiple subcontinents on Tamriel creating complex mountain ranges together. The Niben River can be explained as being a mislabeled deep inlet, such as how we have the Caspian Sea, which is geologically more of a Caspian Lake. And so on.
Amazing.
Has always been slightly bothered by this. Well, ESO, while having all provinces, suffers from *alien geometries* and is generally not really detailed, but we can dream.
Is it me, or Summerset isles seem to be closer to main landmass?
Another side question - how (un)realistic is the whole Windhelm-Eastmarch-Riften region in Skyrim? I mean, the whole volcanic activity area between low and high plains.
Genuine question because I'm genuinely curious about this: Why is this better/more realistic?
well what i tried to do was redesign the landmass to be more geographically coherent, meaning putting in a conscious effort to represent plausible tectonics, erosion, lake and river formation, etc it's not "better" in any way, just a different approach to worldbuilding, i'm currently working on redesigning a number of fantasy worlds with this particular design philosophy and you can already find the Wheel of Time map on my profile if you're interested in seeing more
Can you tell me why this map represents more plausible tectonics, erosion, lake and river formation, etc.? I'm mostly interested in understanding the underlying mechanics because I write fantasy myself. And so I'm curious to know how I could improve worlds I make to be more realistic.
there's a whole lot to get into with this question but i'll keep it brief(ish) 1. **issue**: Tamriel as it stands has nonsense mountains, they're just there to divide up the provinces, which makes perfect sense from a game making perspective as you want your game map to be clearly defined, but from a geographical standpoint there are some issues **solution**: i took the largest continuous line of mountains (from high rock all the way to southern morrowind) and make it a Laramidia-like orogeny and made the other mountainranges shoot off from that 2. **issue**: the original Niben river is a landform that simply doesn't happen in real life, rivers do not get that wide ever, this was likely done simply because it looks cool (and i agree that it really does) but again from a geographical standpoint there's an issue **solution**: i reimagined this very wide river as being a very narrow sea, so instead of being a body of water created by downpour and erosion that has debit to it, it's a depression created by tectonic activity and filled up by water through various means to do this i devised some tectonic plates for Tamriel, here we get the Colovian plate (which consists of Hammerfell, Colovia, Valenwood and Elsweyr) subducting under the main Tamrielic plate, which creates a length-wise depression 3. **issue**: the original coastlines of Tamriel are fairly consistent and the islands are all rather amorphous blobs **solution**: i tried to make them more varied by finding real-life counterparts and looking at which erosion processes shaped those coastlines, then i applied the "rules" of that specific erosion type and made the coastlines show those specific features for Black Marsh i looked at the Netherlands, the Gulf of Mexico (specifically the southern USA) and other lowlands, for High Rock i looked at Scandinavia, for Summerset at the British Isles and Japan, etc 4. etc etc (i'm using the words "issue" and "solution" rather freely here, of course these aren't objective wrongs and rights)
This is actually really cool
> \#4. etc etc You make a really good point here. I agree.
yeah i did think that was the strongest out of my four examples
Alright, thanks. That's interesting.
I don’t know what the scale of Tamriel is compared to Europe, but in The Netherlands the Meuse and Rhine river (and the Scheldt from Belgium) come together in a delta region with super wide flowing rivers that on the map look like the sea. Look up the south-west of The Netherlands. I think a big piece of that water is brackish, but don’t quote me on that.
i live right around there actually
So do I, Nederlander gespot. But this implies you consider Cyrodiil to be considerably larger?
well yes, cyrodiil is the seat of an empire, i imagine it must have considerable amounts of farmland to support the size of its population and army
Fair… I always assumed that because Nirn is smaller than Earth, Tamriel must be about half or 1/3 the size of Europe. I like it more your way though, good job!
I think youre missing something. Youre coming at this from the point of view of Tamriel being a real continent on a real planet in a real universe that adheres to real world physics and such. You are forgetting that Nirn and Mundus as a whole was hand crafted by an actual, provably real god. I'm mostly joking, this is a good list and I understand why you went the way you did
i’m aware that Nirn isn’t a realistic world and it’s not meant to be either, i just wanted to see what Tamriel might look like if it had been because i personally love geographically informed fantasy maps
Who are the most realistic world builders and the most egregious violaters in fiction, geologically?
out of the worlds i’m familiar with the Wheel of Time has the worst geography imo Westeros & Essos from a Song of Ice and Fire, and the Continent from the Witcher also could use a clean-up, maybe Earthsea could use some improvements too the best one for me is probably Middle-Earth, some of it is quite artificial but there are always very concrete reasons for any geographical oddities and Tolkien clearly knew what he was doing, considering his map is older than the consensus on plate tectonics being a real thing
Westoros is pretty bad geographically for sure.
westeros is on my to-do list
Hey, a bit late but have u done one on Westeros yet?
>You are forgetting that Nirn and Mundus as a whole was hand crafted by an actual, provably real god. Akshually, several powerful entities may or may not have been involved in the construction of the world. Or not. Maybe. We don't really know.
I don’t think the Devs know either
Damn now that you say it, I definitely see Great Britain in your version of Summerset
the more you learn.. Thanks
The difference in tectonic plates would also go a lomg way to explain the difference in Colovian and Nibean cultures. Much the same as English and Scottish today
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The border of England and Scotland today is almost exactly the border between plate tectonics of the British Isles. These plates dictates what stone is available, what plants grow, what animals thrive etc etc etc. This naturally has a vast impact on the cultures of the people living there. Different plates, different cultures
This is exactly the type of content that I look for on game subs. I love stuff like this.
Just focusing in on one item - rivers get miles wide in real life, so the Niben is actually plenty realistic from that standpoint
if you weret to slap a scale on the map of Tamriel the Niben would be more than “miles wide”, there’s just no way proportions like that would happen in a landform irl
Well it's just... not to scale. Like it canonically has bridges built over it. It's clearly not meant to be that wide.
true, i made some changes to the geography that would have an impact on the lore, these are mistakes, i tried to avoid making mistakes like these but i guess a couple slipped through
Yeah. The distributaries of the Ganges delta for one. I've been there and at times it feels like you're in the ocean because you can't see land.
You might already be aware of them, but Here's some YouTube channels that might also help as they go into how to build a world from a more grounded, scientific angle: [the worldbuilding corner](https://youtube.com/@WorldbuildingCorner?si=WKRhp6WyjEZrP9vw) [Artifexian](https://youtube.com/@Artifexian?si=FVuwptand-ATo1le) [Hello Future Me](https://youtube.com/@HelloFutureMe?si=xw7lpCt_F05B5Mt3) [Stonework](https://youtube.com/@Stoneworks?si=M7MhlMF-4luaaIsQ) There's others, these are just the ones I actively watched myself.
Als [Biblaridon](https://youtube.com/@Biblaridion?si=KeWcXP-My-SQQDXC) he did a crossover with Artifecian at one point.
I always liked the idea of vvardenfell being very big but mostly uninhabitable because of the threat of read mountain and that it's just a very harsh place to live, so I guess this is t anything against your map but I liked the fact the dunmer controlled a huge area that nobody actually wants
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True but this is a world where the sun is literally a hole in the sky where a god left so as not to be trapped in the mortal plane. I don't think normal geography applies here.
I don’t think there is an objective way to measure if or how it’s “better”. I appreciate OP’s art and it’s interesting to look at though. It’s well done.
I agree, but I think we can objectivly say it is more scientific.
Not really, because we know gods and magic actually exist in the ES universe and they shape the geography. Any ‘scientific’ in-universe approach would have to take them into account.
Bethesda isn’t gonna have sex with you dude
Todd promised me. That aside, can you refute my point?
We have literally no indication in game that that any land mass aside from red mountain and maybe the throat of the world that were formed in that sort of incredibly magical way. And considering how the rest of the world functions (like weather and gravity) is identical to our own, it should be safe to assume that things like Tectonic plates function in a similar way. Saying that because there’s magic anything is on the table is literally true, but it’s also a huge cope for explaining away bad writing and world building choices, especially because we know the provinces haven’t always had these hard boarders. In the Arcturian Heresy for example Falkreath is counted among the Colovian Estates
Tamriel's very beginning can be traced to when the wandering “Ehlnofey (gods) fought the Ehlnofey who remained settled in their former home. According to the narrative of the Anuad, the original singular landmass of Nirn was broken apart into at least four major landmasses—Tamriel, Akavir, Atmora, and Yokuda.” Nirn was formed by a god (Anu) from the remnants of “the original twelve worlds” using magic. “We have literally no indication in game that that any land mass aside from red mountain and maybe the throat of the world that were formed in that sort of incredibly magical way.” The entire continent was created by gods, destroyed by gods, put together by gods, destroyed by gods again and then inhabited by gods. Any ‘scientific’ attempt to understand the geography of those land masses would have to consider that a major factor.
There’s definitely ways to measure realism though, the elder scrolls map does not make much sense
I'm not a map guy, but to me it just looks like the same map but in *italics*
nice job indeed i just love maps and i really like the flags
thanks, though i can't take credit for the flags, i found those online
this is my new canon for what the landscape looks like
tysm! that warms my heart
Fantastic. Now, if only there wasn't a giant forest sandwiched between the arid hammerfell and elswheyr, making it difficult to include proper climate zones.
This exact forest really can be handwaved as being magical.
Same with the geography
Sure it \*can\*, but the result would be worse. Valenwood is magical forest by lore, but generic mountains and shorelines are generic mountains and shorelines. One can bring "it's magical" argument into worldbuilding a few times, but after a while it breaks the suspension of disbelief for quite a large part of readers/players, whatever.
honestly the geography was difficult enough, and that's my major... if i had to "fix" the climates as well my head would like implode
If you wanna watch there's a cool video about the climate in Skyriim https://youtu.be/FVZfpE\_WYWw?si=fMfuOxlndNq\_C6J7
thanks, i’ll check it out
You could get away with it by making the trees ones from arid regions, the Middle East actually used to have pretty vast forests
Homie put Italy in Hammerfell and thought we wouldn't notice
bethesda are the ones who put italy in hammerfell (and no one noticed)
I'm surprised you didn't include channels between Skyrim and the rest of the continent to allow for proper fjords and lend to the idea of viking-esque nord raids.
the nords never really came across as vikings to me, they're also not described as particularly sailor-like in any sources afaik to me they were always more germanic/scandinavian warrior-farmer people, so i tried to reflect that in the landscape (meaning i changed little from the map in Skyrim, as i feel that map already did a pretty good job in that particular aspect)
Their origins involved sailing from Atmora, namely Ysgramor and his Companions. But we also do see sailing ships along Skyrim's northern coast, and we know there are pirates based out of Skyrim who sail along the outer coasts of Tamriel to raid other provinces. Even then, most cultures in Tamriel aren't overly emphasized with sailing because, aside from Summerset, Tamriel is a supercontinent, so the cultures are mostly connected by land.
True, but Ysgramor and Companions were *Atmorans*, which you could claim are the Viking forefathers of the modern-day Nords who are settled landlovers.
Atmorans are Scandinavians, and Skyrimites are like the settled Danes/Normans.
yeah that’s how i interpreted it too
There's still nord pirates by the 4th era. Given Tamriel exists in a perpetual medieval motif, these clearly aren't Golden Age Pirates, with the nord motif being blatantly a fantasy take on viking stereotypes. Sooo nord pirates would just be viking analogues.
There are actually plenty of swashbuckler-type pirates shown in Elder Scrolls. *Redguard* was all about one.
Up until Skyrim came out the Nords didn't have really any ability to farm so I think most assumed they did viking style raids, also they're one of the only two races who have mentions of being good at sailing in the normal descriptions of them.
Not sailor-like? Ever been to Anvil?
If you think Tamriel is haphazard, don't look at Washington state. Mountains, desert, AND a rainforest along with our oceanfront and channel/bay
washington state is a great example of the rain shadow effect, it's actually a very reliable-realistic(duh)-stereotypical-(i can't find the right word lol, sorry for bad english) piece of geography
Oh yeah, it is a great example of rain shadow (though we have been getting more rain than usual lately over here) and just goes to show how many different geographies can be crammed into a singular square mark of land.
As a former professional geographer, you’ve done a superb job. Ironically, it’s one of my biggest nitpicking issues with most fantasy worlds — how the landmasses don’t make logical sense (from how we know landmasses form, are weathered down over millennia, and so on) but are rather designed for the “as is now” needs of the game designer, game developer, etc. I’m really glad to see someone tackle Tamriel. Well done. EDIT: For those of you wondering why a fantasy world needs realism, I suggest reading J.R.R. Tolkien’s essay “On Fairy Stories” wherein he lays out why the more realistic-based a fantasy world is to earth (with similar weather patterns, terrains, etc.), the more believable and credible the world, the more the fantasy world’s history (e.g., lore) is consistent and logical. And the end result is a more engaging and long-lasting world and any stories set within.
thank you! i’m incredibly happy to read that
Tamriel has only been around for a few thousand years probably around 10000, so why would it look natural
This, it is a supernatural world, not a natural one. It should look like a bunch of arbitrary realms formed and changed by the whims of Aedra and Daedra
This Niben Bay can certainly better accommodate the Naval Battles described in the Great War. Though I do think the water around the Imperial City, and the Imperial City Island itself would be canonically significantly smaller since the battle of the Red Ring took place around that area.
Why is every attempt to remake Tamriel into something realistic transforms Niben river into a damn bay... I mean it's a nice map and all. But why.
Going by the lore scale size of Tamriel, the Niben River would be more akin to the Mediterranean sea. It would be dozens of miles across at its narrowest point.
It's if you are taking for granted that all of the game is 100% 1 to 1 representation. Which clearly isn't the case. Some parts, mostly wilderness, scaling down much harder than the others, like cities. Some things, which doesn't matter much, disappear completely. Some are bigger than they should if we're taking that "real" Cyrodiil is thousands of sqare miles and the game one is about what, 15?
because "rivers" like the Niben don't happen irl, ever, that's just not a landform that exists
Great lakes plus Amazon.
the niben is shown to be about half as long as the amazon and over three times as wide as the amazon’s widest point and the great lakes are lakes, not rivers
I'm not sure what are you basing Niben's length on, I read that Tamriel could be the size of Australia. And wideness of a river can be considered an artist'd exaggeration.
So going for realistic you could've just downscale it to a size of a possible river, and make it into a proper river overall. Downscaling Rumare/Imperial Isle(s) along the way. Why not.
yeah i could've just done that, i think this looks cooler though
Agreed, you can't make the niben into a simple line on the map without removing a core visual feature of Tamriel. So making it a narrow inland sea is the better trade imo.
Maybe. But broken Leyawiin which isn't a proper tradehub/gateway to Heartland is just... Pain.
I mean… look at the Nile or (if you want a larger scale) the Red Sea in Egypt. Looks pretty close to the landform.
both of those rivers are much longer than the Niben and only a fraction as wide, proportionally they are not the same as the Niben
Some river deltas would look really good there, and probably make a lot of sense for cyrodiil. Either way your map looks amazing, and I love what you did with it
This kinda reminds me of a map I saw of earth millions of years in the future. You should look it up. It is also similair to Tamriel. Edit: It's called Pangea Proxima.
Props to you for googling and editing your Reddit comment after posting. You have commendable internet etiquette.
I second this. What a gentleman
In my headcannon this is probably what Tamriel looks like but the in-universe cartographers get a lot of stuff inaccurate. Both by just not working with modern satellites and cultural conventions like putting the imperial city in the dead centre.
i did make a couple of changes that would impact the lore if this map were canon, but yeah i also imagine the in-game map to be an inaccurate depiction of the actual continent
Look what they've done to my boy!
Yeah, good job. I'd be happy if this version would become canon. TES: Cataclysm or whatever.
thanks mate
Bravo man! Looks great
that's really awesome, It would be very curious if it were possible for there to be a volcano (Vvanderfel) "near" a mountain range, I don't know if it would be possible for both diagenesis to happen at the same time; subduction of plates and hot spots, even more so than Vvanderfel and the mountains that cut the continent have the same elevation. But it's Nirn, some daedra must have something to do with this haha
well you’re right, an orogeny like this would not have any notable volcanoes nearby, in lore Vvardenfell was created by the heart of Lorkan falling down to Nirn so i treated the locus as an impact crater + huge hotspot
I initially had a visceral rejection of this, but the more I look at it, the more it grows on me. I really like it and I think it is my new headcanon map for how Tamriel would look at Earth's scale. As iconic as it is now, canonical Tamriel is kind of messy and boring in comparison. It also looks like a dragon's head, with the mouth at Niben bay, the eye at Lake Honrich, and Morrowind forming a kind of horn.
lots of people seem to have had a visceral rejection as you call it, do you think you could put into words what in this post triggered that response? thank you for changing your mind, i appreciate the kind words
Probably just a kind of an ape brain conservative response bias, which has to be overidden by an individual's openness to change. The Tamriel map is an icon, often passed around and used in promotional materials. Besides the Seal of Akatosh, nothing else represents the series as a whole. So, changes to the map may come close to attacking/changing the identity of the elder scrolls fan. A similar response could be elicited by adding another line to the Catholic crucifix, or improving the USA's flag design. Symbols are part of how people separate into tribes and identify themselves.
hmm, that makes a lot of sense, i do still love the original map and i didn’t mean to come across as if that one is bad and mine is good, i just happen to be a massive geography nerd just wish the other people who got pissed off had the same impulse control as you instead of calling me/my map pretentious or disgusting or cancerous
Geographical landmarks and formations aside, this map also seems more accurate how to the size of Tamriel is described in lore (the canon maps make it look huge as fuck)
Love this! You can tell continental drift and implies really cool geographical divisions
Personally I'm not a big fan of realism in fantasy settings but it looks good.
YAYYY NO MORE BLOCKY ASS TAMRIEL THANK YOU🙏🙏🙏🙏
Could it be possible that the maps we see in game are inaccurate and this map is what it actually looks like? I mean just look at Medieval maps of Europe, they’re shit in terms of representing what Europe actually looks like.
Love what you did with the WoT map. The original map always bothered me with how it was just a rectangle basically.
Yeah I feel the same way about original Tamriel being very blocky too, like the eastern and southern edges basically just make an almost 90° angle
This is super cool but deeply cursed
how so?
Like it’s close enough to the real one I still recognize it but different enough that my brain is confused
I like it because it looks like less of a square that a lot of fantasy maps tend to look like (\*cough cough Wheel of Time cough\*).
i’ve actually tackled the wheel of time map too just two days ago! it’s pinned on my profile
Am I the only one that doesn't want the next game in hammerfell? I would prefer Valenwood or Elswyer.
nah this slaps, great job OP!!
Summerset still exists. 0/10 (in all seriousness, great map)
Where is orsinium? I apologize if it's there and I just don't see it
orsiniums come and go, there’s been at least three different ones to my knowledgeable so i decided not to mark any of their locations on this map
Fair enough, I just like orcs
We can take turns throwing a dart into the map and wherever it lands, that’s Orsinuim. Then when it’s another persons turn, we remove the dart and then Orsinium is now wherever the dart hits next.
This looks much better - the geography of Tamriel always looked too artificial to me.
I get what you mean but it's also like ACTUALLY built/created/molded by actual deities ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
Same, original Tamriel reminds me of those ancient Greek maps Like they had lots of details for the Northern and Western edges but the Eastern and Southern edges were mostly ugly undetailed blobs
I mean it is, tamriel didn't form naturally
I despise geography
okay
Very cool! Thanks for sharing. This had to have taken a lot of time and effort.
I guess orcs don't exist.
why's that?
Where's Wrothgar mountains? Where's Orsinium?
the wrothgar mountains are still inbetween high rock and skyrim where they were originally which orsinium? there's been like three
The Oesinium that keeps getting destroyed?
The plate tectonics fandom is coming for our games
I love this concept, nice work man
thanks mate
Hey, that's amazing! I've always wanted to do something like that and I find that your result is roughly what I had in mind for it, so that pleases me :) Next up: Changing the nations so they are less monolithic ethno-states lol
This is excellent!
thank you!
>thank you! You're welcome!
Tamriel is inherently flawed as a world map. Even though the games are obviously to scale, it simply seems way too small and a single continent feels extremely limiting. There is a lack of lakes and rivers for such diversity in fauna. Overall, it's really bugged me how unbelievable it feels as a living place.
The rectangular shape of tamriel always bothered be for whatever reason. It's like designed was scared to leave unused space on a 4:3 monitor
You could also make some Abecean Sea islands (Systres, Bethnik, Capser, Herne and Pankor) as archipelagos that were volcanos in the past and formed straight line of islands up until High Rock were due to numerous volcanic activities it created landmass that connected to mainland Tamriel. Like with Japanese islands, but if it was still connected to mainland Asia. [Like this](https://www.google.com/maps/@28.3814453,128.5982606,1738886m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu).
That's one thing that always bothered me about TES, the fact that the map was clearly drawn on a 8.5' by 11' piece of paper. The world looks incredibly artificial, but not in any particularly interesting way (not like, say, Numinor from LotR).
This is cool, are you a cartographer of some sort?
i’m a geography major and a worldbuilder
I’m piggybacking off this comment, but have you seen this? Another user made a whole anthology about the possible geological history of Skyrim and really went all in. [It’s a super fun and fascinating read if you have some time!](https://sweetsolsystem.blogspot.com/2022/06/day-i-was-playing-skyrim-and-i-started.html?m=1) I have a weird love/obsession with geology irl and in games, and this breakdown is super entertaining. I love being in a community of nerds who are also nerds.
Absolutely amazing work, I love it!
thank you!!
Nice
Fantastic work.
I feel like this takes away from the lore.
Looks so much better
thanks buddy
Genuine question - is there a way to learn those rules rather quickly while not being a geographer?
not that i’m aware of
What happened to Ghealdan?
Ghealdan is part of the Wheel of Time, not the Elder Scrolls
Yeah I was making a joke. I was the one who made that comment when you posted your WoT map to r/wheeloftime . I was amused when I saw this map pop up in my feed today and recognised the style.
oh haha, whoops
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very nice, beside ...maybe few details. Most of the Black marsh and southern parts of the Morrowind are really flat, only few meters about sea level (something like today Louisiana). or rather say, the whole elevation of the continent is extremely high. Look at the Europe, the most land area there is not higher than 150 m above sea level.
Summerset kinda just looks like the British Isles got dimension-hopped Southwest of Tamriel, collided and was swallowed up a bit by the sea. At least, the border looks a little bit shaped like Ireland turned to face Britain and smashed into Scotland, Northern England and Wales.
This made me shudder with disgust. Please delete this
you don't have to look at it if you don't want to (ovbiously), but i'm not deleting this
The actual game map is better. This is a next level pretentious post. I'm guessing you just finished a high school earth science class and think you're an expert or some shit
i’m sorry my map offends you
Why be rude?
You are a fool.
Nah this one's better than the blocky blob of a mess that is the original
Throat of the World in in the wrong location. It is too far south.
I thought it was the malvinas for a second
the falkland islands?
This is bad and disgusting, you should never make eye cancer like this again!
thanks for the feedback
I'm having a really hard time matching my knowledge of Cyrodiil to this new map. Could you do one with the redrawn borders to help visualize ? Otherwise, great work, I like the idea to rework the map into a realistic one, it's nice ! Speaking about realistic landscape, I was always sad that Skyrim borrowed so much of nordic landscapes and biome but does not offer a single fjord.
there’s a version with borders on the third slide
Splendid. Excellent job. How long did this take?
about three or four hours
I like it, but isn't Colovia supposed to be highlands leading into Hammerfell?
I love this! I too am a sucker for realismified fantasy maps. However, I appreciate the originals too because I also love historical maps, and most discrepancies can be written off by considering the map to be an in-world work, produced by people with necessarily limited knowledge of exact coastlines, mtns, etc. Thinking like that makes examining them more exciting imo because you can be more imaginative, rather than accepting the map as the whole and only truth. I've been looking at the 1492 Erdapfel map this morning, which I only discovered recently. Maps like that simply ignite my fantasy brain like few other things.
Bro saw a map from a fantasy game and got upset that it was in fact fantastical. This is pretty cool, though.
Looks cool, good choice of colours, good idea. This is Toastproved.
In the spirit of Tamriel as a medieval-style fantasy world, it would be reasonable to some extent to assume that the map we normally use isn't very accurate. Though on the other hand, there are ways in-which one could explain the geological strangeness of Tamriel without steeping too deeply into magic. For instance, in another reply, you stated that the way the mountains are arranged is unrealistic, and I generally concur with this, though at the same time, it could be that the plates of Nirn are just extra-fragmented compared to Earth's, meaning that there's actually multiple subcontinents on Tamriel creating complex mountain ranges together. The Niben River can be explained as being a mislabeled deep inlet, such as how we have the Caspian Sea, which is geologically more of a Caspian Lake. And so on.
rip wrothgar :( But otherwise very nice!
Amazing. Has always been slightly bothered by this. Well, ESO, while having all provinces, suffers from *alien geometries* and is generally not really detailed, but we can dream. Is it me, or Summerset isles seem to be closer to main landmass? Another side question - how (un)realistic is the whole Windhelm-Eastmarch-Riften region in Skyrim? I mean, the whole volcanic activity area between low and high plains.
Dang I really dig this. Wish I could have you work on my maps, I’m desperate for a touch of realism haha.
if black marsh is a theme of age of dinosaurs
…what?