Map of the Fortnight: Main Discussion Thread

Another win for @Prince di Corsica with a very neat take on 1984 is "The National Republics of western Eurasia"!

I wanted to remind folks that nominations for the Turtledove Awards are currently open, including the category for best map. If there has been a map from one of the past year's contests that you thought was particularly memorable or exceptional, consider nominating it for an award!

Also, we currently have no entries submitted for MotF 230; does anyone besides @The Tai-Pan have one in progress?
 
Another win for @Prince di Corsica with a very neat take on 1984 is "The National Republics of western Eurasia"!

I wanted to remind folks that nominations for the Turtledove Awards are currently open, including the category for best map. If there has been a map from one of the past year's contests that you thought was particularly memorable or exceptional, consider nominating it for an award!

Also, we currently have no entries submitted for MotF 230; does anyone besides @The Tai-Pan have one in progress?

I'm working on one, hopefully I can finish it tomorrow
 
Another win for @Prince di Corsica with a very neat take on 1984 is "The National Republics of western Eurasia"!

I wanted to remind folks that nominations for the Turtledove Awards are currently open, including the category for best map. If there has been a map from one of the past year's contests that you thought was particularly memorable or exceptional, consider nominating it for an award!

Also, we currently have no entries submitted for MotF 230; does anyone besides @The Tai-Pan have one in progress?
I've started something but little time to devote to it.
 
Another win for @Prince di Corsica with a very neat take on 1984 is "The National Republics of western Eurasia"!

I wanted to remind folks that nominations for the Turtledove Awards are currently open, including the category for best map. If there has been a map from one of the past year's contests that you thought was particularly memorable or exceptional, consider nominating it for an award!

Also, we currently have no entries submitted for MotF 230; does anyone besides @The Tai-Pan have one in progress?
I have one near completion.
 
...as you can see, I've lost every MotF I've ever entered. In retrospect I can see why nobody voted for my first few, but I've been getting better.
2050 alliances.png

NAFTA (hq: Denver) - You might be tempted to call it "America and friends', but that's not exactly true - Canada and California are powers on par with America, and Mexico and Texas aren't far behind. America lost California, Texas, Oregon and Washington to seperatists in the political chaos of the early 2020s. (Oregon and Wasdhington eventually folded into Canada, though.) Canada, on the other hand, while losing Quebec (sans Montreal and the north), picked up Greenland, the Faroes, and a chunk of Far East Russia.
EFTA (hq: Brussels) - The USE and buddies. Backstory: In 2037, the EU's nations held a poll for unification. Those that voted yes formed the USE. Some of those that voted no later formed Zapadoslavia.
EACO (hq: Samarkand)- China, India, and buddies. India picked up a little after the messy Pakistani Civil War and the complete and utter destruction of Bangladesh, but lost Assam after a domino effect of refugees fleeing east.
PRCS (hq: Singapore) - Japan, ASEAN and Australia trying to counter the EACO.
Baghdad Accord (hq: Baghdad) - The result of a 2025 convention that finally sorted out the Middle East. The next thing they did was hike up oil prices for no reason. After that, they built a giant solar farm in the Empty Quarter. Thinking about unification.
African Union (hq: Lagos) - Africa's answer to the EU, and very Nigeria-dominated. Also thinking about unification.

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The Kamikari Khanate at its maximum extent
Now that Calamity Ganon is gone and Hyrule is rebuilding, a new threat has arisen in the western steppes. The Kamikari, a race of tall nomadic horse-like people not too dissimilar to Hyrule's Lynels, are terrorising Hylian settlements along the Daltus River and even penetrating into the Gerudo Desert - thank Hylia for the great canyon separating us from them! Just recently have they seized Daltus Town, our greatest colony in the West, and they aren't stopping. Hyrule's military is trying to hold them back, but ultimately time will tell if Hyrule will fall or peace will be made.
- a member of Hyrule's military
At its maximum extent, the Kamikari Khanate supported a population of 137, mostly Kamikari but with some Hylian and Gerudo minorities, spread over 55.5 square kilomerers of area.
They say war never changes, but war in the 2050s would hardly be recognized as war by people from half a century ago. Were one to describe warfare nowadays to someone from fifty years ago, they'd call it no-rules bot battles. And given how much more automated war has become in the 21st century, they wouldn't be all that wrong. Yet when you let autonomous tanks and drones do all the fighting, it's hard to know where they all are and how much territory your side controls, especially if the battleground is a barren, uninhabited place, like the Sahara Desert.
And there's one happening right there right now. Rebels in the Darfur region of Sudan have seized factories producing war robots and declared independence. Major frontlines are known, but the exact zone of control is unknown. The Sudanese government thinks it's just another minor insurrection. The Darfur rebels think they've got it in the metaphorical bag. The truth is somewhere in between, but we don't know exactly where.
darfur3.png
sheikahpunk1.png

Thirty years have passed since Hyrule was last saved from calamity and Ganon was defeated. Now, the very tools used by the evil forces of Calamity Ganon[1] to wreak havoc on our kingdom, we are starting to put to our own good.

More than ten thousand years ago, the Sheikah people created a technology more advanced than anything we can produce nowadays. They produced armies of Guardians, autonomous soldiers able to fire powerful beams of light, and five Divine Beasts, enormous contraptions piloted by the Champions of each race, to defend this realm. However, one hundred and thirty years ago, Calamity Ganon hijacked the Guardians and Divine Beasts, turning them against us and leaving Hyrule in disarray, in an event known as the Great Calamity. Fortunately, Link, with the aid of the Champions' successors, managed to defeat Calamity Ganon and free Hyrule from its wrath. Since then, much progress has been made into researching the origins of this ancient technology, and finding new uses for it. Researchers at the Hateno Ancient Tech Lab have been researching the function and abilities of the Sheikah Slate, a mysterious tablet-like device, while those at the Akkala Ancient Tech Lab have managed to repurpose parts of decayed Guardians into functioning weapons and armor. Meanwhile, researchers at the newly reopened Central Ancient Tech Lab are inquiring on how ancient technology was produced - a consensus is yet to be reached, but there is some speculation that the ancient Sheikah technology is made of a special ceramic - and trying to replicate it, with no success. Whilst ancient technology is on the minds of most of Hyrule's researchers, one young aspiring Gerudo vai [woman] named Renami has taken up researching the mechanics of electricity in a bunker in an isolated part of the Gerudo Desert, from pieces salvaged from ancient shrines and the Divine Beast Vah Naboris.

Over the last 30 years, Hyrule has grown from a disparate collection of small towns scattered throughout the kingdom's edges to a fully functioning nation. Central Hyrule used to be one half ruins and the other half ruins with Guardians and Malice on top. Now it’s being converted into farmland to feed Hyrule’s booming population. Castle Town, only recently a place where no man would dare go, is now a grand metropolis of almost 100 people serving as the kingdom’s capital city. Other newly rebuilt towns, including Raore Town in Central Hyrule, Sarita Town in the Necluda Valley, and Tabantha Village in Hebra, have also attracted an influx of new residents. The construction of the Lanayru Canal linking the Hylia river system with the eastern ocean has resulted in a boom in maritime trade and allowed harbor towns such as Molida, Mido, Kitano, Lurelin and Laverra to flourish.

With its internal problems solved, Hyrule is free to set its sights outwards. To the west, the warlike Kamikari Khanate has been defeated and accepted Hylian sovereignty, leaving Hylian colonies on the Daltus River, such as the growing Daltus Town, mostly undisturbed (save for the infrequent raid by the Yiga Clan). The Zonai rainforest to Hyrule’s south has had only light penetration by Hylian and Gerudo colonialists, being mostly virgin earth save for outposts around Lake Gustaf. The Gongoro islands to the southeast and east have seen a few coastal settlements; less to for the mangroves of Yaltum.
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Excerpt from A Cartographical History of the World, published 2061

The Scramble for Antarctica: The Colonisation of the Virgin Continent​

Whilst Europe was busy colonising and exploiting the Americas, Africa, parts of Asia and Oceania, there left one continent untouched and unexploited: Antarctica. Whilst a vast southern continent was theorised to exist since classical times, it would remain unseen until 1820, when a Russian expedition led by Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen caught a glimpse of the icy landmass, and untouched until one year later when American sealer John Davis set foot on it. The 1900s and 1910s, the "Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration", saw many expeditions attempting to reach the South Pole, many failing; the first success was achieved by the Norwegian Roald Amundsen and crew in 1911, winning a race against the British Robert Falcon Scott, whose party all died on the return trip. Whilst many nations had been laying claim to sectors of Antarctica to protect whaling and sealing rights, the 1959 Antarctic Treaty set aside the continent for scientific research and prohibited any permanent settlement and military activity.

Come 2048, and the Antarctic Treaty expired. A lot had changed in that 89 years; the rise of China, India and other Asian powers; the disintegration of the British Emipre; the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War; wars in Vietnam, the Balkans, the Middle East, America and India; the collapse of the United States as the sole world hegemon; unification in Europe; computers transforming from room-filling calculators to pocket machines more powerful than all 10 billion of us combined; even men and women taking steps on the Moon and Mars. Yet most critically, we've also pumped carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere in quantities large enough to heat up the Earth by a few degrees. Among others, this has had the side effect of melting the Arctic and Antarctic ice caps melt, enough to make polar regions slightly more habitable (in exchange for making sea levels rise slightly everywhere else). And as the glaciers retreated, more opportunities would have opened for colonisation of the great not-so-white south, were it not for the Antarctic Treaty. Colonising Antarctica is something some nations would rush to do at the first moment possible, and many others would sooner or later take advantage of. So when the Antarctic Treaty expired, many aspiring powers leapt at the chance.
  • Argentina was one of the first to move people to the continent, having a prime position (being given the Falklands and other British sub-Antarctic islands after the dissolution of the British monarchy) and many research bases well-prepared to house people for long periods of time. Argentina currently controls the South Orkney Islands, the eastern coast of the Antarctic Peninsula, San Martin base on the western side, and parts of the Luitpold Coast.
  • Chile is similar to Argentina; in fact Chile was the first to allow permanent settlement in Antarctica. Chile controls the South Shetland Islands (including the town of Eduardo Frei-Bellingshausen, an amalgamation of multiple bases on King George Island and Antarctica's most populous settlement), the western coast of the Antarctic Peninsula, and a minor strip in Ellsworth Land.
  • Uruguay and Cisplatina are minor powers trying to get in on the Antarctic game, with colonies on islands in the Ronne Sea.
  • Norway never bothered with colonising Antarctica, and only control the uninhabited Peter I Island.
  • England, having lost all of its existing colonies, looked into Antarctica to regain prestige. With the South Orkneys, South Shetlands and Graham Land already taken by Chile or Argentina, they were left with Adelaide Island off the Antarctic Peninsula and part of Coats Land.
  • The United States of Europe inherited the research stations of multiple European nations, including German bases in Queen Maud Land and French bases in Adélie Land. More colonies have since been built in the deglaciated parts of George V Land.
  • India and China are relative newcomers to the Antarctic game, but they're determined to conquer the continent. India controls some parts of Queen Maud Land, including Maitri Station which has significant Brahui and Rohingya immigrant populations, while China controls some stations in East Antarctica.
  • Japan, after already filling Sakhalin with otakus, is eyeing off Antarctica to boost its falling population. Japan controls a part of Enderby Land.
  • Russia, humiliated twice, is also looking south to get back up onto the international stage. Russia controls some land by the Amery Gulf, part of Queen Mary Land, and the western tip of Edward VII Land.
  • Australia, already having the largest swathe of Antarctica in their arms with the Treaty, could afford to send out settlers over a wide portion of East Antarctica.
  • New Zealand hit the metaphorical jackpot by taking control of the important McMurdo Station, now the second-most populous in Antarctica, formerly an American possession. New Zealand controls the coast of Victoria Land and some sub-Antarctic islands elsewhere.
  • Canada and Pacifica took up America's slack after it crumbled in the Second Civil War, including in Antarctic colonisation. Both are exploiting new coastal land opened up by glaciers melting into lakes and connecting with the ocean; Canada in western Ellsworth Land, Pacifica in eastern Marie Byrd Land.
  • To prevent disputes over the South Pole, the United Nations asserted control over the South Pole and all territories below 85°S. The UN also constructed the port settlement of Neu Framheim (named after Amundsen's original landing site) on the Ross Sea to provide supplies.
Other nations have expressed interest in colonising Antarctica, including America, Peru, Grão Para, Brazil, Nigeria, South Africa, East Africa, the Baghdad Accord, Indonesia and Korea, but they are yet to stake any claims.
 
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