Why You Need a Map

They’re an under-appreciated element of the fantasy genre, it’s true: the maps at the beginning of those books, those adventures, only took up one or two pages compared to the hundreds more of story and character. But for me - and I’m guessing for any hardcore fantasy nerd - those two pages were worth a hundred. That's why you need a map: I would spend hours tracing the distances between cities, imagining the valleys and peaks, the strange and wondrous new worlds trapped in black and white. 

If you’re making your own world, you need to have a map. There are countless reasons - which I will go into now - but at the very least, you need to do it for the other nerds who will also spend their precious time hunched over the page. 

For the World

This reason is fairly obvious, and that’s why it’s at the start of this article. We all know that we use GPS now, but for those of us reading this that remember the days when you would have to keep a map in the car to find your way around, we know that the value of a map has only been overlooked in the modern day. We couldn’t go anywhere without one.

For your world, and the people in it, you need to have a map to show them what they’re looking at when they plan their journeys. How far is it from the Shire to Mordor? How close are Redania and Nilfgaard, really? How long would it take to sail from Riva to the boundless Malloria? These are the questions that every adventurer will have to ask before they even set foot on the road, and if you are tracking their journey every step of the way, a list of places and dates will only go so far. 

Create your Mental Image

There’s nothing more important for a story than that immersion for the audience - if they fall out of the world while you’re telling the story, you may never get them back. Keeping their disbelief suspended is the primary goal of a storyteller. And to maintain that immersion, you need a foolproof mental image of your world. 

How better to achieve that than with a map? 

Reader Immersion

Speaking of reader immersion, remember that nerd hunched over the map at the beginning of their fantasy book? That’s the other reason we’re doing this. The amount of time you’re going to put into making a good map will pay off tenfold if you take it seriously. 

Think of it as an investment of time: the time you put in early will pay off later. 

Consistency and Coherence

How tall are the Misty Mountains? Where is the nearest pass through the peaks? What kind of trees will you find on the slopes? How many bends does the river take as it flows down the valley? Does the tower overlook the sea or the bay? Where is the treeline? How tall is the cliff? 

The list of questions never ends, when you’re creating your own world. 

Geographical Consistency

The benefit of a map that you make is that both you and your characters are looking at the same world: the landmarks, the regions, the roads and rivers will all the be the same on the page. No skipping over a desert or forgetting that a marshland exists as you pass by the second time. 

That consistency is vital to maintaining the immersion of the story.

Cultural and Historical Context

An under-rated reason for a map, but definitely my personal reason for making them: whenever I make a new world, the first thing that I do is make a map of the world. I fill it with mountains and rivers, coastlines and forest, cities and roads, and then I ask myself: what does that imply?

When you add in a pass over the mountain, and a small village wedged up there in the stones, what does that mean for the village? When you have a tower on the edge of a town, overlooking the sea, why would that have been built there? 

Maps are filled with answers to questions that you have not asked yourself yet. 

Plot Development

There are two reasons in this one, but they can really be summarised by two words: “getting lost”.

No one likes getting lost, but it happens all the time. And because people get lost all the time, it means two things - that geography itself is an obstacle to any journey, and that people plan for the likelihood that they’ll wander in the wrong direction. How do they plan? 

That’s right. With a map. 

Journeys and Quests

Two vital elements of any story, and they will both refer to getting lost along the way. It’s not only a likelihood - many will tell you that getting lost is a crucial part of any journey. You have to get lost in order to eventually arrive at your destination. But when your characters look at a map and plan their journey, where do they expect to get lost? Only a fool does not plan for that eventuality. Are your characters fools? 

Geographical Challenges

This one is similar to the last, but it’s something that we should address: when you’re going on a quest, following a trail, finding a destination, the distance is only one obstacle. It’s far from the only challenge that you will encounter on the road. 

We’re spoiled now with highways and train lines, planes and cruiseliners. The problem with an ocean is not the distance. It’s the sun, the heat, the wet waterlessness, the vast and uncompromising barren nothingness of the waves. The same goes for a desert. 

To someone without a plane, a mountain is an incredible obstacle. Climbing mountains fully burdened is difficult enough, but in the wintertime? 

Look over your world from above, and you will see the obstacles implied in it. 

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There are so many reasons to need a map for your writing - to create your world, to help your readers, to understand your characters - but it can only help you when you are building your story. It’s not difficult to make a map (check out our other posts for tips and tricks), and the time that you put into it will pay off handsomely. 

Good luck out there!