Mapping out The City.

[Mugla]

Indeed Bronze, we have one piece of a hill that causes the River-bending. The details are sketchy, as the Sealed Section canals have to be taken into account and so forth.

[str8g8]

Mugla: I'm well aware of the link between New Market and Shalebridge of course. but it's fundamentally the same layout so I don't see the problem with that, the river bend itself could be shuffled down a little if need be. This was really a rough draft as far as placing the original game maps, which had a knock on effect with the district borders. So there was always a patch of Old Quarter between NewMarket and Shalebridge, because it's there on the Assassin and Keeper map.

It was an assumption earlier on that the marketplace in the Ambush map corresponded to New Market so it got placed over there, even though it never really worked out (because we know G lived in South Quarter). Then we tried to keep G's apt as close as possible to the "Home Turf" note on Assassins. But I have come to the belief that the Ambush map shows us the heart of South Quarter. "Home Turf" can refer to South Quarter in general. And Gilver can go the Crippled Burrick.

Regarding the odd shape of Old Quarter: yes it is odd However if you bear in mind that Downtowne and Stonemarket could be considered part of Old Quarter (note the smaller typeface used for these districts, as opposed to the full Quarters) then the overall shape is not so odd.

I think Hightowne is on high ground (it accounts for the bend in the river).

cheers
str8g8

[Doc_Brown]

Three new maps?

You guys aren't making this any easier!

[kamyk]

Has anyone got a rough sketch of this yet? I'd be really interested in seeing it. Even if it looks like a five year old drew it.

[Solabusca]

Dude. Click on any of the blue links, and you'll see what's been worked up. There's been something like six iterations of the str8g8 map alone.

.j.

[str8g8]

Well, I finally got my act together and sorted out some webspace . Check out this link for the latest maps (actually there are no changes, I'm still waiting for more feedback on the new postition of the Ambush map) ... but for anyone interested you can now download a layered psd file (it's 12mb though so be warned!).

You can also see some screenshots of upcoming FM The Bridge, and some other stuff.

cheers
str8g8

[MorbusG]

Ah, nice idea st8g8. I did the same thing.
I've updated my map a little again.
I guess it's time for me to explain my reasoning behind the placements (these things are known, but repeating them doesn't hurt, I hope).

South quarter
I like to think New Market as a subdistrict of south quarter.
Garrett's home in T3 is entirely certain, as the water fountain is right next to it in-game.
The location of waterfountain can be seen at least from the ending cutscene of T3.

Location of New market is somewhat certain, as it needs to be positioned so, that on it's southern part should be Garrett's home from T1/2 (as seen from TDP assassins-map), and on it's northeast side should be old quarter. This poses a problem, though, as Mugla said: relation and distance of New Market <-> Shalebridge (the oh, so well known conversation of rivers being low). I'll get back to that a bit later. The hometurf mark on the map can indeed be interpreted as a more general meaning; ie. South quarter.
Moving it (assassins-/keepers grotto-map) more up north basically means also making Old quarter larger.

Garrett's home from T1/2 is a bit more tricky, as it can be placed in several ways. I placed it next to one of the larger streets, quite close to G's apartment in T3, so that the ambush-map from T2 lines roughly so that graveyard from T2 and T3 line up. The streets don't look pretty this way, but I've taken some artistic liberty to rotate the bottom part of ambush for approx. 45 degrees.

Interestingly enough, no-one noticed that I had flipped vertically the T3 South quarter map. My reasoning was pretty simple: in T3 at one point you can take a shortcut to Fort Ironwood via black alley. On original map, it would have pointed to west! Also, pagan tunnels would have come up in ~Stone market! I know you guys don't like rotating or flipping maps, but this just *had* to be done.

Wayside Docks
At first I wanted to put Rampones as close to Crippled Burrick-bar as possible, but seeing the Docks district in-game compass needle in T3 actually points to east, I wanted to break a compromise and rotated T3 Docks 45 degrees (because you can't see the east-shore, only sea).
This ruled out Rampones at that location, as the only place where T3-Docks can be placed when rotated, is on the east side.

Old Quarter
I like to think Stone Market and a general area called Down towne both part of the Old Quarter. Down towne could very well be also spanned across other districts. Somehow the word "downtown" means the center of a city to me.
Also, keeper compound is described in one of the T3 briefings as being "in the heart of the city", which also gives me the feeling of being in the center of the city. Having said that, unfortunately keeper library is closer to Downtowne than Keeper compound.
Old quarter is crowded. One of my main objectives was a logical placement and relation of Keeper compound and Keeper libraries. If you take the photoshop layered file, you can enable the compound layers to see how it works out. Other than that, I'm not entirely happy with the looks of my Old Quarter layout.
I wanted to create some relation between the sealed section and the walls around new market. New market walls, as they are, don't make much sense: if they are to prevent attackers from north, why would the rich people be on that side of wall which gets run over? The only logical assumption in addition to that, was the street name Auldale street. It does seem logical that a street of that name would go to Auldale.

New Quarter
There was no other reasoning for the location than that it's on opposite side of Old Quarter (which, in my opinion, isn't a necessity), and making South Quarter look more like in center of city.

North Quarter
Again, no logical reasoning behind placement... well, it's in north. Heh.

Eastport
Well, I thought it was nicer to swap placement of eastport/dayport since Baron's way keeps going east after Dayport, and the other road intersects it N-S.

Dayport
"I live near Dayport, and used to have nice view of the mountains. Every morning used to watch sunrise, now that metal mostrosity" etc. Which basically means it has to be as east as you can get.

Auldale
Not much logical reasoning behind this one. I think I copied it from str8g8.

What's missing?
Man, we have one of us *living* in Shalebridge, and we still can't be certain of it's location! T3 in-game would put it somewhere in/near Old Quarter, but taking into account every evidence, it seems the second evidence nullifies the third, and so on. If I had put it in Old Quarter, it
a) wouldn't be on the opposite side of The River
b) wouldn't fit in there.

So what I'm going to do, is list all the alternatives, one more time (I think I have a couple of new ones)

1. Shalebridge above sealed section
- not on the other side of river
+ possible logical reason for relation with new market

2. Shalebridge above Auldale
- bad contrast. Old money and thugs
+ other side of river

3. Grotto map is flipped vertically, plus the river in it is The River, plus New Market is a nickname for Stone Market.
- Eh?
- Lol

Well, there wasn't that many alternatives after all.
Anyway, great work everyone! Keep it coming!

[Mugla]

Some sites (and art!) you've got there guys.

I got my hands tied down now, so I'll try to go everything over on the next weekend. For now I'll just voyeur -around.

[Solabusca]

Nice work on the Cityscape, str8g8! Very, very nice work indeed.

.j.

[DSept]

I really like these maps especially st8g8's. It really helps to bring out the construction of the city. There are, however a couple of points I'm unsure of.
2 Olde Quarters? doesn't seem to work. I always believed that the Hammerites rebuilt the Olde Quarter after Thief 2 and constructed fort Ironwood as well.

And just out of interest what is the small map to the very eastern edge?

[kamyk]

Very nice work people. I have been fascinated with this idea since I started playing with TDS, and discovered that the map portals seemed to have some inconsistencies in terms of location/destination geographically speaking.

I will have to keep up with this thread. I'd really love to make an FM incorporating all of the districts from all of the games if it is ever consistently possible.

[str8g8]

@DSept: I hope it doesn't look as if there are two Old Quarters ... although that was broached as an idea way back I have always tried to maintain a single Old Quarter. It's just that Stonemarket, Downtowne and the sealed section take a big bite out of it ... It might help to think of those areas as smaller districts which are part of Old Quarter.

But I don't think there is any suggestion that the Old Quarter was rebuilt. Remember that the Sealed Section is only a part (ie a section) of Old Quarter - T3 just shows us the bit that was destroyed in the Catastrophe.

The small map out to the east is the Truart Estate.

@sysq: although I didn't notice you had flipped the South Quarter map it doesn't mean you can get away with it The main problem is that it contradicts the players experience of the game in a fairly fundamental way. If you are running out of space then maybe you are trying to squash them in too tightly? That shortcut you mention to Fort Ironwood was a Keeper thing wasn't it? I think we can assume a secret network of Keeper tunnels or something ...

str8g8

[MorbusG]

Well, T3 South Quarter map would have to be microscopicly tiny so that the pagan grounds (the one you come into after T3 pagan tunnels) wouldn't pop up in the middle of the city. There is no way to make it fit, because the water fountain can't be moved. Flipping the map was the only solution.
Doc_Brown's prophecy is catching up on me it seems.

[Solabusca]

Str8g8, we seem to be coming up against a wall once again with regards to Shalebridge and Newmarket.

SV2C0201 - I swear, I've never seen the river this low!
SV1C0202 - Drought twelve years back? That was almost as bad as this.
SV2C0203 - You can nearly walk across, up at Shalebridge!
SV1C0204 - Hmmm! Wouldn't New Market love that!

Again, the justification to have NM directly across the river from SB is very, very strong - so strong that placing it anywhere else is difficult.

The thing I keep pondering is this : Yes, it's across a river, but is it the BIG DAMN RIVER, or is it a tributary? Then I come back to the Keeper map from TG and thinking that if Shalebridge is a sub-section of OQ, it fits well - especially if we start thinking of the City in terms of a heavily waterlogged, canal-based port town.

I'm thinking back to some things in THIS THREAD... as it stands, your map has become very unwieldy - the layout of OQ is, as I've previously stated, very, very unlikely in terms of City development, even with the Barricades coming into existence.

Again, it might be a pet theory of mine, but it's one that carries a lot of weight with it - Shalebridge and OQ are connected by something more than a cradle - especially after reviewing the dialogue and the Keeper's Map.

[Doc_Brown]

I'm still waiting for more feedback

Sorry 'bout that. The trio of terror there threw me for a loop, then I had to go on an extended holiday this past weekend that's completely thrown me off my routine. Let me regroup, and then I'll hit these.

By the by, this is stunning. You continue to impress.

Doc_Brown's prophecy is catching up on me it seems.

Muah-ha-ha-ha-haaaa...

Str8g8, we seem to be coming up against a wall once again with regards to Shalebridge and Newmarket.

Looks like things are heating up here yet again...

[str8g8]

Str8g8, we seem to be coming up against a wall once again with regards to Shalebridge and Newmarket.

Yes, it keeps coming up, doesn't it? I can only repeat what was discussed in this thread before - and it was discussed, quite a lot, probably more than any other single topic.

The river the servants are discussing is the big River - if they were talking about the little tributory you actually see in Assassins then why are they so surprised to see it so low and why would NM be horrified ... you could just jump across anyway. It only makes sense in the context of a Big River.

On the other hand, their comments don't dictate Shalebridge is directly bordering New Market, and in fact we have 2 good maps (the keeper map you posted and Garrett's hand-drawn Assassin map) which show New Market and Old Qaurter but make no mention of Shalebridge.

So, it doesn't have to be directly across at all, just across. But it does have to be across the main river.

In my map the relationship between New Market and Shalebridge is still there - if you were a beggar who walked across the River at Shalebridge, then New Market would be the first well-to-do area you would come across, and you wouldn't have far to go either.

Also, I just don't see OQ as unwieldy ... it occupies quite a logical space within the elbow of the river. It seems quite tidy to me, especially, as I say, if we consider Downtowne and Stone Market districts to be part of the Old Quarter (as I've tried to indicate on the map with different font sizes and similar colours...)

As always though the test of any theory is to put it into practice. If you can come up with a better arrangement then post it, and if we can make it fly then it will get assimilated.

cheers
str8g8

[Solabusca]

Check it out. In the TDS Full City map, there's a cistern, lake or canal off to the left of OQ and north of Docks.

Take a look at it this way - the Keeper Map seems to imply that the area it's looking at is pretty big, but what if it's TINY next to the bloody whole of the City?



.j.

[Solabusca]

Also, I just don't see OQ as unwieldy ... it occupies quite a logical space within the elbow of the river. It seems quite tidy to me, especially, as I say, if we consider Downtowne and Stone Market districts to be part of the Old Quarter (as I've tried to indicate on the map with different font sizes and similar colours...)

Take a look at some historical maps - city sections just don't sprawl and twist that way! Neighbourhoods tend to be bounded by wall (in medieval locales) or other geographical boundaries.

Check it out -

LONDON.
http://www.britainshistory.com/downl...n_boroughs.jpg

AMSTERDAM
http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/...msterdam_m.gif

NEW YORK
http://nyctmc.org/images/fiveboroughs_4boroughs.gif

PARIS
http://www.parisbreak.co.uk/images/paris-plan.jpg

PRAGUE
http://www.ibs-sro.cz/images/Living_...f%20Prague.jpg

VENICE
http://www.umich.edu/~hartspc/histar...venicemap2.gif

Some fantasy examples for you:

SANCTUARY
http://www.home.earthlink.net/~jcook16682/sanctuary.jpg

LANKHMAR (if ever a city inspired the City, it was Lankhmar)
http://www.worldofskell.com/POV%20Images/Lankhmar1.gif
http://home.vicnet.net.au/~qbird/maps/gfdist2.gif

str8g8 - I admire your talent, and think you've done an insane amount of work for the project, but if you look at these examples, you'll see that it's pretty clear that cities don't form like that. I think you're clinging to a theory you like in spite of the growing arguement against it, primarily because it's something you've been working so damn hard on - and again, you have my thanks for all the work you've put into this.

You've invested a lot in your theories - and I appreciate that - but I still think that your current map isn't ringing quite true. I'm only trying to help. I've been interested in the outcome for a hell of a long time, you see.


.j.

[EDIT - Sweet mother-jumping Hades. I've been hard at work on this and another project all bloody night - and I've got to be awake in around three hours to get ready for the workday! AUUUUUUGH! Evil debator, to make me suffer so... and tonight is my Karaoke night, so sleep don't come soon enough!]

[str8g8]

This is an abstract of the current Quarter boundaries.


I just don't see what the problem is

city sections just don't sprawl and twist that way! Neighbourhoods tend to be bounded by wall (in medieval locales) or other geographical boundaries.

Well, Old Quarter is bound by the river to the North and East, the Docks to the South, and the area of highground occupied by Hightown to the West!

BTW, I hope I'm not too attached to any theory ... the current map is the result of quite a few people's opinions not just my own. The last change I made was very recent and far-reaching (moving the Ambush map down near the Docks) and came out of sysqc's suggestions.

I'm just using the best current thoeory. If you come up with a better one I'll use that instead. Simple as that.

But thankyou for posting your ideas in visual form, that is always the first step and we can finally get to the meat of it. Right off I can see you forgot the Assassin map:

Now, I'm not a fan of this particular map, it coincides and contradicts the Keeper map in all sorts of annoying and frustrating ways, but it is there and we have to deal with it.

It overlays the keeper map but adds a note "Home Turf" at the bottom. We know that Garrett is a "South Quarter independant thief" so the keeper/assassin map must be above South Quarter, if not directly next to it.

Keep 'em coming
str8g8

[MorbusG]

After I watched again the cutscene B09.avi from TDP (lost city), I can't help but think that the smaller river isn't as small as you see in assassins.
Another image I took from CS06.avi showing G's apartments surroundings.

[mol]

By the by, this is stunning. You continue to impress.

It's not often that I change my desktop wallpaper. Now I did.

Darn right it's stunning.

[MorbusG]

@solabusca
Nice try there, but as str8g8 said, the assassins map can't be located there.
(heh, I tried it myself, actually )
A little more up, though, and it would actually fit pretty nicely. Hmm, I'll be back to this later.

@str8g8
Well I want to thank you, too, for all the hard work you've done for this project. While I'm still waiting for your comment about the smaller river, I just wanted you to see the "easiest" solution *if* it was the smaller river talked upon in the infamous river-low conversation.

Your current layout is acceptable at the moment to me, with two exceptions: 1) Shalebride. While I can see the long, long reasonings behind it, it doesn't make me a happy man. However, I can, with some tongue biting, accept it.
2) Shoalsgate. Was it purely to make balance over districts over both sides of river? Imaginatory district, but again, some tongue biting should get me over it.
I hope I didn't sound too rude, it was not my intention (it comes with the fennoscandic genes)

[Solabusca]

This is an abstract of the current Quarter boundaries.

*SNIP USEFUL IMAGE*

I just don't see what the problem is

The map without text or colour is very, very helpful. Thanks for that! It gives me the chance to better parse what you're trying to do with OQ.

Right off I can see you forgot the Assassin map:
**ASSASSINS MAP**
Now, I'm not a fan of this particular map, it coincides and contradicts the Keeper map in all sorts of annoying and frustrating ways, but it is there and we have to deal with it.

It overlays the keeper map but adds a note "Home Turf" at the bottom. We know that Garrett is a "South Quarter independant thief" so the keeper/assassin map must be above South Quarter, if not directly next to it.

One thing - the assassin's map says Home Turf, not South Quarter - we know that G. uses multiple hidey-holes - it's why he's bolting to SB in T2.

So how do we know that Home Turf is SQ in this instance? The note that Ramirez has might refer to one of G's other apartments. If it is NOT SQ, it re-opens a lot of possibilities.

Yeah, SB being dead near or part of OQ is my particular hobgoblin. *I'm* attatched to the idea of it - I just believe it's something that needs to be worked over more.

Heh. We should beg Viki to throw us a bone here.

Oh, and again - led me praise the webpage and artwork, str8g8. You're too bloody talented.

.j.

.j.

[str8g8]

Well, lotsof things to get to grips with here



sysqc: that's a really good find ... definately something that we have overlooked up until now, I believe.

Shalesbridge
Out of interest, I refer you guys to page 11 of this thread where in an earlier incarnation of the map I put Shalebridge exactly there. Mugla kinda convinced me otherwise ... well, I'm not so sure anymore. Maybe he should remind us why?

It might me simpler, but it does invlolve a slight-of-hand in assuming Shalebridge is part of Old Quarter, and assuming that the keeper and Assassin maps completely fail to mention it. That involves a fair bit of tongue-biting as well.

Shoalsgate
Shoalsgate does involve some creative licence ... fact is there isn't much information to go on one way or the other. There is a Shoalsgate Station and a Shoalsgate Tavern, so there is at least the implication that it is a district or area of some kind ... and other then that, yes, it served a purpose by filling a hole between Shalesbridge and Auldale.

Home Turf
That Home Turf = South Quarter isn't categorical fact (what is?) but I think we'd be stretching things too much and for the wrong reasons to pretend otherwise.

Implications
If we move Shalesbridge however, it means there is no need to put a crook in the river ... it also means there is no need for Shoalsgate there ... also the city becomes quite unbalanced again ... In fact, this will change the entire character of the present map, which I actually like ...

btw, sysqc, your map currently places the Hammerite Temple in the Sealed Section.

@mol: I'm honoured
and everyone else who like the site and artwork, thanks! I'll hopefully be posting some more paintings in the future, stay tuned.

cheers
str8g8

[Shadow Play]

I seem to recall that image being brought up sometime in the far past - wasn't there a question as to whether or not that was actually a picture of Karath-Din?

Of course, The City is built on Karath-Din, but since the entire thing was buried underground, any rivers depicted as part of it might have been substantially altered by the extreme geological activity.