The importance of maps in world building

A friend of mine is in the process of setting up a MUD, and we’re going through a world building exercise.

I’d managed to come up with a description of a location (and the journey to get to it) that I was pretty happy with, and then someone came up with a map which contradicted it. There were two choices, either the description needed to be changed or the map did.

I didn’t want to add an ocean voyage so I set about amending the map so I could make my proposal for the general layout of the world. It was soon after that that I realized my error. The start of the journey that was described was in a temperate region, while the end was in a desert, and they were at the same Latitude. That, combined with their closeness, mean that the weather simply didn’t make sense.

In future, I’ll always draw a map to make sure that where I put things makes sense.