Table of Contents
The Map of the Fortnight Contest Challenges
For the MotF main page please go here.
This page is a summary for all of the challenges suggested and used for the MotF contest.
Feel free to use these challenges for inspiration, check whether an idea you had has been suggested before, or re-suggest challenges included on this page (including ones that have been run before) in the MotF Main Thread.
Adding New Challenges
Anyone may add new challenges onto this page, but they must be suggested in the Main Thread before being added here.
To add a challenge to this page click on the “Edit this page” button (shaped like a pencil) at the top-right, then copy the following section:
Example Challenge Title | New | Example challenge text. |
Then paste this in the Unused Challenges list on a new line, being sure to maintain the list's alphabetical order, and replace the example title and text with the title and text of your own challenge, then save the page.
New challenges must be added with only the “New” category tag - a contest official will then evaluate the challenge and replace the “New” with the appropriate category tags for that challenge, as well as possibly rewriting the challenge text.
If you have any issues or questions regarding adding challenges to this page (or indeed anything about the MotF contest) feel free to contact Krall by posting in the Main Thread or by sending him a private message on the forums.
Unused challenge suggestions are shown in alphabetical order of their titles (with initial articles - such as “the”, “a”, and “an” - not being counted). Used challenge suggestions are shown in chronological order. Both are sorted into the following categories:
- Apocalyptic/Dystopian - Challenges involving world-as-we-know-it ending events and/or dystopic societies.
- Conflict - Challenges based around wars, conflict, and national aggression.
- Divergence - Challenges based off of a point of divergence or a specific divergence from our timeline.
- Fantasy, Paranormal, Sci-fi, and ASB (FPS-ASB) - Challenges based around scenarios, themes, and tropes from fantasy, paranormal, and science fiction, as well as blatantly implausible (ASB) challenges.
- MotM - Challenges suggested specifically for Map of the Month rounds.
- New - Challenges not yet evaluated by a MotF contest official.
- Personal - Challenges focused on one person.
- Single country - Challenges which focus on one country.
- Social/Cultural - Challenges based around the culture and society of an alternate timeline.
- Style - Challenges focused on making timelines or maps in a specific style.
Unused Challenges
Challenge Title | Category | Challenge Text |
---|---|---|
#Map | Style | Make a Map with 140 or fewer characters on it. |
101 Dalmatians | Conflict | Make a map showing an ethnic group rising up in rebellion. |
99 Luftballons | Conflict | Make a map showing the aftereffects of a military incident caused by an overreaction to a benign threat. |
Africa Gets A Boost | Divergence | Make a map showing Africa, or African colonized-areas abroad, in a world where iron-age empire-building civilization in west Africa got started at least a millenium before OTL. |
Ain't Our God No More | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a country or region where one or more ethnic minorities have suddenly converted to a different religion than that of the ethnic majority. |
The Anywhere Spring | Conflict | Make a map showing a localized armed uprising against a government and the localized remnants of that government after the rebels have overthrown it. |
All In The Name | Single country | Make a map showing a country, city, or region which has recently undergone a significant name change. |
All Roads Lead Away From Rome | - | Make a map showing the neighbors of a great power, be it on the rise or decline. |
Always Look on the Bright Side e of Life | Single country, Conflict | Make a map showing a country after a war that has moved on and developed as though the war never happened. |
Always Something New Out of Africa | Divergence | Make a map showing a historically significant African nation that didn't exist OTL. |
Always the Bridesmaid | Single Country | Make a map showing a secondary power that is constantly overshadowed by a more powerful ally. |
Antiquated Union | Single Country | Make a map showing a nation that survived from Antiquity to the Present Day. |
Art of Carving | Single country | Make a map of a rump state that lost some if not most of its core territories. |
Arthur's Empire | Single country | Make a map showing the Empire of Arthur and his heirs, anywhere from 400 to 2011 AD. |
Ashes to Ashes | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing a steampunk society that has run out of or reached peak coal. |
Back to the Future | - | Make a map showing what someone from the past thinks the world will look like in the future. |
The Badlands | - | Make a map showing a dangerous, sparsely populated region. |
Better Together | Single Country | Make a map showing a union state of two ostensibly equal nations. |
Before the Fall | Single Country | Make a map showing the maximum extent of an expansionist country before it is turned back and shrinks. |
Beyond the Borders | - | Make a map showing the organisation of one or several non-state actors. |
Blame Kaiphranos | - | Make a map showing an unexpected country with two warm-water ports, a transcontinental railroad to connect them and Alsace-Lorraine. |
Boom 'til Bust | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a settlement, region, or country that experienced a major economic boom or resource rush after the boom has died down. |
The Boys Are Back in Town | - | Make a map showing a state that is descended from a state that no longer exists. |
The Brady Bunch | - | Make a map showing a world in the present day with a very small number of independent countries. |
Calculus Of Power | - | Make a map showing the effects of political horse trades. |
Catastrophe (Almost) Averted | - | Make a map showing a world where a major “Horrible Event” was about to happen, but averted at the last second- but not before some significant damage was done. Examples: War of the Worlds: The Martians died before they could destroy the rest of the planet, but London and environs are an absolute mess. Deep Impact: Yeah, the big rock was blown up, but the little one still wiped out the Atlantic seaboard. Fail Safe: Nuclear war was averted, but at the cost of New York and Moscow. |
Celebrity | Personal | Make a map showing the consequences of a celebrity successfully going into politics (who did not do so in our world). |
Changing The Clockworks | - | Make a map showing a substantial administrative reform. |
Columbus Was Right | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing the results of Columbus, not the Greeks, being right about the circumference of the Earth. |
Condemned to Repeat It | Conflict | Make a map showing the situation immediately before, during, or after a war that is fundamentally similar to a previous war. |
The Conspirationist Kookbook | - | Make a map showing an ATL as seen through the warped lenses of a conspiracy theorist. |
A Country Fit for a Villain | FPS-ASB, Single country | Make a map showing a country ruled by a supervillain. |
Crossover Showdown | Conflict | Show recognizable ATL versions of two unrelated OTL empires facing off against each other. (Romans vs. Zulus, Mongols vs. Inca, etc.) |
Darkest Night | Conflict | Make a map showing a country or region at the time of a mass-killing of a minority or other marginalised group. |
Destiny, Altered | Personal | Make a map showing a world/region affected by a prominent OTL person's career going on a different path than OTL. |
Deus Vult | Conflict, Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a religiously motivated war, or the results of said war. |
The Devil You Know | Conflict | Make a map showing the partnerships and conflicts between two nations. |
Driving the Autobahn | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a highway system. |
Did the Harvest to Their Sickle Yield | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a world where a plant that was not domesticated in our timeline was domesticated, or where a plant that was domesticated in our timeline was domesticated earlier. |
Domino Effect | Conflict | Make a map showing the process and/or aftermath of a quick series of uprisings, successful or not, in several countries that share a common aim or inspiration. |
Don't look at them, my child | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing the main population areas of an underclass in a country. |
Down Without the Sickness | Divergence | Make a map showing an ATL where an OTL plague was prevented/delayed (Black Death, Spanish Flu, Cholera). |
Dulce et Decorum Est | Conflict | Make a map showing a war with high soldier casualties that does not involve nuclear weapons. |
Easiest to Remember | Divergence | Make a map showing an OTL volatile border that in an ATL remained unchanged and is instantly recognizable. |
The Empires No One Suspected | - | Make a map showing a large empire that no one would have though could happen before it did. For example the Mongol Empire, the early Caliphate, etc. |
The End Is Nigh! | - | Make a map showing the predicted effects of a looming disaster either real or imagined. |
The Enemy of My Enemy | Conflict | Make a map showing what happens when, instead of capitalists and socialists fight against fascists, this world has fascists and capitalists team up against the socialists. |
The Eperopolis | - | Make a map showing the conurbation of several (formerly) independent cities. |
Escape From the Dustbin of History | Divergence | Make a map showing a now-extinct nation (Khazaria, The Khanate of the Golden Horde, the Inca Empire, etc.) which survives until modern times, modern times being defined as the era of the internet, nuclear weapons, etc. |
The Evil Empire | Divergence | Make a map showing an empire that broke up IOTL lasting longer. |
Exodus | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a diaspora. |
Ex Uno Plures | Conflict | Make a map of a defeated country being broken up into smaller states after a war. |
False Start | Conflict | Make a map showing an up-and-coming Great Power getting its nose bloodied because it tried to punch above its weight class before it was really ready. |
Fantastick Inspiration | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing a fantasy senario based on historic events or a historic period. |
Fantasy Fan | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing an existing fantasy setting or an alternate history version of the same. |
Feign Themselves Just Men | Conflict | Make a map showing a region or country which is the focal point for espionage conflict between two nations in an ATL Cold War. |
First Nationstates | Divergence | Make a map showing what happens when Indigenous American tribes advance technologically faster than they did in our timeline, and the formation of organized states is more widespread. |
For All the Saints | Divergence, Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a world where the East-West schism never happens. |
Five Minutes to Midnight | Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing the world on the brink of destruction. |
For the Ladies | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a world where a women's liberation movement of some sort succeeded over much of the globe at least a century earlier than OTL. |
For the People, By the People | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a world where socialism is much more successful than OTL. |
Fortnight Event Convention | - | Make a map showing an event that spanned two weeks. |
Fresh Air | - | Make a map showing a park, forest, or other natural setting.The natural area can be supported by a national, regional, or local agency, or completely unofficial. |
Freedom of Movement | Social/Cultural, Style | Make a map showing migration that is not a standard political map. |
The Frigid Cold | - | Make a map showing a country or subdivision of a country that exists entirely within the Artic or Antarctic circle. |
From Nothing to Nightmare | Conflict | Make a map showing a once backwards, weak country that has become a powerful pariah state. |
From the West | Divergence | Make a map showing the western Americas being colonized by Asian countries. |
Fry it Up | Single Country | Make a map showing a country with a panhandle. |
From The Worldweek | Style | Make a map in the style of maps used in news media. |
Gerry's Salamander | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a border (national or sub-national) designed to help or hinder a specific demographic group. |
Give Me Liberty, or Give Me Death! | Conflict | Make a map showing an ongoing revolt or rebellion. |
The Golden Age | - | Make a map showing a country or civilisation in a Golden Age. |
Globar War Series | Conflict, Style | Make a series of maps showing the chronological progress of a world war. |
Great is Our Sin | Conflict | Make a map showing a region or the world during or after a conflict that used Weapons of Mass Destruction (i.e. Bioweapon, Chemical Weapon, Nuke or Radiological weapon). |
The Great Rebuilding | - | Make a map showing an urban reconstruction effort. |
The Guide | Style | Make a map showing a guidebook entry to show a tourist/hitchhiking route, places of interest, landmarks, etc. |
Guns of the X | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing a world where a group of time travelers go back in time to give a group anachronistically powerful weapons. |
Happy Holidays! | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing which holiday is most popular or the level of popularity of a single holiday in a specific region or the whole world. |
The Hatters Parliament | Divergence | Make a map showing a world or nation in which a benign OTL ideology has been taken to twisted extremes. For example anti-Racism leading to it being illegal for people to marry within their race. |
Here be Dragons | - | Make a map showing a major nation that hasn't been explored by Europeans yet. |
Here be Dragons and Giants | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing the world or a region (as in the America's or Oceania) as imagined by medieval explorers with little to no information about it. OTL examples of this would be Terra Australis or the belief that California was a large island. |
Hero of the Day, Vampire of the Night | Conflict | Make a map showing the unpleasant effects of a war. |
The Holy Elsewhere | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a pivotal holy place that is away from the main areas of the religion it is important to. |
Hope and Change | - | Make a map showing the results of a realigning election in a nation. Realigning elections for example is UK 1945, 1983, 1997 & USA 1860, 1896, 1932, 1968, 1980 , 2008. |
Human Nature | - | Make a map showing an attempt by humans to preserve the natural environment. |
Humanity's Finest Hour | - | Make a map showing the operations of an organisation dedicated to helping people. The organisation may be regional, national, or international, and you may show all or several of its operations or focus on its actions in one country or region or at one time. “Helping people” includes providing information (including organisations dedicated to scientific research and transparent journalism), providing healthcare, protected against disaster, protecting rights and liberties (both in general and those of minorities), etc. |
Hunny, I'm Home! | Social/Cultural, Single Country | Make a map showing a Nomad-based State. |
If Stirling Never Stopped | Conflict | Make a map showing a country analogous to the Domination of Draka, e.g. Large, militaristic China or over-expanding, hostile Raj. |
Implausible Colonizers | Single country | Make a map showing the colonial empire of a nation not known for it in OTL. |
In At the Death | Conflict | Make a map showing the aftermath of a war in which one side was forced into unconditional surrender. |
In the Ghetto | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a specific ethnic or religious group that has been forced to live in segregation from the rest of the population, either as nomads or confined to specific areas. |
Islands in the Sea | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing the aftereffects of a person, place, or area having been transported back in time. |
Just the Two of Us | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing a world in which humanity shares the planet with another fairly wide-spread intelligent species. They must have been aware of each other's existence for at least a couple centuries, so no fair 1492 with American chicken-people. |
KABOOM | Divergence | Make a map showing the world in 1950 after Yellowstone has a mild, but still devastating, eruption in 1897. |
Kaiju A Go-Go | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing a map of a city, region or the world where there are Kaiju attacks. |
Keeping up with the Firangis | Divergence | Make a map showing what happens when the Islamic nations have their own scientific revolution in parallel to the Christian one in the 1600s. |
Let's Get Depressing! | Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing a world in which either the Soviet Union, the Third Reich, or the Mega-Japanese empire pass as the top Good Guys. |
Light and Dark | Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing a utopia and a dystopia co-existing. |
Lights, Camera, ACTION! | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a national or international movie industry. |
Like A Phoenix Rising | Divergence | Make a map showing a city that was once great but declined in OTL, that in your map either never declined or rose to be great again. |
The Little Apple | Divergence | Make a map showing a settlement which became a major city in OTL but didn't in this timeline. |
A Little-Known Fact | - | Make a map about a person, place, or idea which is well known in OTL but only a footnote in the world of the map. (The campaigns of Alexander, the king of Macedon who got himself killed at the Granicus, surviving communities of that weird Jewish sect called Christianity, etc.) |
Lo, How the Mighty Have Fallen | - | Make a map showing a previously powerful nation being divided up. |
Look Upon My Works, Ye Mighty, And Despair | - | Make a map showing a successfully built megastructure, either showing the structure itself, its location, or the political or social conditions that caused its construction. |
A Looong TL A' Windin' | - | Make a map set in the modern day in an ATL with a PoD before 500CE. |
Loose Change | - | Make a map showing the events proposed by an ATL conspiracy theory. |
Lonely Light | - | Make a map showing a country or region which is in a bad situation, that is still an improvement over their previous situation. |
Lotsa Flowers Bloomed | - | Make a map showing a world with 5 socialist great powers in it. |
Make Others Do The Dirty Work | Conflict | Make a map of a proxy war. |
Manifest Destiny | Conflict, Single country | Make a map showing a country with the belief that it is destined to expand and grow, and uses it to justify its own aggressive imperialist expansion. |
Many Drops Making A Sea | Conflict | Make a map showing multiple, separate conflicts taking place in the same region. |
Map of the Fortnight | - | Make a map showing a country or region during two weeks that changed the world or their aftermath. |
Mark of a Nation | Style, MotM | Make a map showing a political entity (be it an international organization, nation, subdivision, etc.) and depict its various symbols (such as flags, coat of arms, etc.). |
Military Illogic | - | Make a map showing a polity that possesses some military function that makes no sense, like a Landlocked country with a navy or a country with a large mountain division when the country and surrounding areas have no mountains. |
Municipal Pride | Divergence | Make a map showing a city that was destroyed in OTL surviving in an ATL. |
More Than One Can Chew | - | Make a map showing an empire shortly before it collapses from overstretching, or after it has collapsed from overstretching. |
More Than You Can Chew | Conflict | Make a map showing a minor incident or conflict which rapidly grew to a major international conflict. |
More Than Words | Style | Create a map that stands on its own. Other than labels on the map itself, the map shall have no accompanying explanations, either on the map or in the forum. |
Mosaic Earth | - | Make a map Showing a world made out of areas from different periods of history, like a Mosaic Earth TL. |
My Beloved Nemesis | Conflict | Make a map showing two countries that were formerly violent rivals, but are now cordial and friendly. |
My Friends Are My Power | Conflict | Make a map showing a war where an alliance of many weak countries wins against one or a few stronger countries. |
My Superpower 'Tis of Thee | Single country | Make a map showing a former colony that has become a superpower. |
A Nation Displaced | Single country | Make a map showing a government-in-exile that possess land. |
A Nation Divided | Single country, Conflict | Make a map showing one nation that is divided into separate independent states. |
Natives? What Natives? | - | Make a map showing arbitrary colonial borders. |
New Jersey | Divergence | Make a map showing a “New Jersey” located somewhere other than OTL's New Jersey. |
New New England | Divergence | Make a map showing a “New England” located somewhere other than OTL's New England. |
The NEW New Zion | Divergence | Make a map showing an alternate resettlement of the Latter Day Saint movement in a place other than Utah. |
A New World | Divergence | Make a map showing an alternate colonization of North America. |
No Industrial Revolution | Divergence | Make a map showing what happens when, for whatever reason, be it economic, political, social or technological, the 17th century Industrial Revolution in Britain is derailed. |
No One Does It Like You | Conflict, Single country | Make a map showing a country divided by popular vote, then reunited by force. |
No, WE'RE The Real Government | Conflict | Make a map showing a country during a civil war that's gone on long enough that most people outside the country just think of it as having split into multiple countries. Examples from OTL would be Korea with the ROK vs. the DPRK, or China with the PRC vs. the ROC. |
The Not-so-Civil War | Conflict | Make a map showing a country in the middle of a civil war. This must not be any ordinary rebellion, but a true civil war that involves most, if not all of a country. |
Nothing is True, Everything is Permitted | Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing a state's attempt to rewrite history. |
Now-Punk | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing a world the the technology and culture of a modern (1950s onwards) time period has been extrapolated and exaggerated. |
The Ocean is Full of Terrors | - | Make a map showing a state founded by a seaborne conquest or migration. |
Of Myths and Legends | FPS-ASB, Divergence | Make a map showing a world where some element of fantasy or folklore exists in the real world. |
The Old Country | Single country | Make a map showing a country that has survived in recognisable form for over 1000 years. |
One for You, One for Me | - | Make a map showing two or more powers dividing a region among themselves. |
One Of Them Is Not Like The Other | Single Country | Make a map showing a country that stands out compared to its neighbors. |
One Small Step | - | Make a map showing some aspect of space exploration or travel within the Solar System. |
On the Run from the Science Police | Social/Cultural, Divergence | Maps from a world in which rather than Communism, Technocracy was the major 20th century alternate to liberal Capitalism. |
An Overlay of Universes | Style | Make a single map showing the differences in borders between an ATL and OTL. |
Pastures New | - | Make a map showing an artificially created landmass. |
Poland Can Into Space | Divergence, Single Country | Make a map showing a much more powerful Poland. |
The Price of Victory | Conflict | Make a map showing a Pyrrhic victory. |
A Premature Birth | Single country | Make a map showing an independent Ukraine, Poland, Syria, USA, etc. or the formation of a Yugoslavia or an Israel or any other “created” nation earlier than when it was formed in OTL. |
The Presidents of Paradise | Single country | Make a map showing a state that started off with idealistic aims, but now violates those ideals. |
Prosperity and Poverty | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing an area sharply divided by income/class, where the rich has all the power and the poor none. |
Public Opinion | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing the results of a public opinion poll. |
The Puppet Masters | - | Make a map showing what happens when an OTL conspiracy theory is true. |
Puzzling Provinces | Divergence | Make a map showing a country's alternate internal borders |
Quite a Few, Actually | - | Make a map showing a world where the territories governed by the Pope are militarily formidable. |
The Republic of Genetalia | - | Make a map showing a country that looks like one or more sex organs. |
The Return of the King | - | Make a map showing a country where the ruling dynasty was removed from power, but later returned to power. “Dynasties” in countries with non-hereditary forms of government (like the Kennedys or Roosevelts) are permitted. |
Rhodesians Never Die | Single country | Make a map showing a country with some form of institutionalised segregation. |
The Right Man in the Wrong Place | Personal | Make a map showing what would happen if a different person rose to prominence or influence during a time of crises or a time where that person could make all the difference in the world. |
Room 101 | - | Make a map showing the methods an oppressive state uses to control its populace. E.g.: propaganda broadcasting, intelligence agencies, prisons, or anything else that can be used to root out dissent and/or indoctrinate citizens. |
Rule of the People | Social/Cultural, Divergence | Make a map showing a world or portion where the ancient origins of the concept of democracy arose or are widely considered to have arisen somewhere other than Greece. |
The Rush is On! | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing the aftermath or effects of a rush for a resource (such as gold or oil) that is not in a location where it is in OTL. |
Saints out of Sinners | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a country which had been oppressive, backwards, and/or prejudiced, but has made significant progress in becoming more accepting and free. |
Same Old Same Old | - | Make a map showing a positively clichéd scenario cluttering up the Alternate AH forum. |
The Scramble | - | Make a map showing an area that has quickly come under control of multiple, competing, foreign powers. |
The Seas we Make Ourselves | - | Make a map showing an artificially created body of water. |
Shakeit World Order | Divergence, FPS-ASB | Make a map showing the world with alternate landforms. |
Show, Don't Tell | Style | Make a map with no words or letters on it. |
SIC SEMPER TYRANNIS | Single country | Make a map showing a nation that succeeded on the world stage massively OTL (The British Empire, The USA, The USSR, etc) that is a shell of its alternate self, or simply non-existent. |
The Sick Man | Single country | Make a map showing a declining great power. |
Stepping Out Of The Shadows | Single country | Make a map showing a state that became a great power that did not become a great power in OTL |
Straight Outta Da Pulps | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a world or region as it appears in the popular fiction of another timeline. |
Strictly Business | - | Make a map showing something related to an alternate illegal or legally dubious organisation. |
Stuck in the Middle of You | Single country | Make a map of an independent nation that is entirely surrounded by another country. |
Special Needs | - | Make a map showing territory controlled by a non-national entity, be it a supranational organization, a corporation, a religious organization. |
Special Treatment | - | Make a map showing a Hong Kong-style Special Administrative Region where a small enclave of a country is, for almost all intents and purposes, separate. |
The Sun Never Sets | Single country | Make a map showing a country that spans several continents. |
Sunshine and Happiness | - | Make a map showing a country or region where things are good and feelings of optimism are widespread. |
The Taller They Are | Conflict | Make a map showing one side of a war - who will ultimately lose - just as they look like they're going to win. The Axis' early successes in WWII is a good OTL example. |
Terraformation | - | Make a map showing a man-made gographical feature : an artificial mountain, lake, island, a canal (urbanization does not count). This geographical alteration must be intentional (not the result of pollution or of a technological disaster), visible from the surface and of large scale. |
There Once Was a Man from Nantucket | - | Make a map showing the result of a region of the Earth being ISOTed. The map can either be of the ISOTed region in its new world or the world it left behind. |
They Came from Earth-2 | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing a world which has been invaded/colonized/contacted by a parallel Earth. |
They're Living Where Now? | - | Make a map showing a large minority of a group that has migrated to an area no one would think of, an example of this would be a successful Green Ukraine that exists at the same time as Ukraine. |
This is my Boomstick | - | Make a map showing a rising world power in Sub-Saharan Africa. |
The Thorn in the Foot | Conflict | Make a map showing a guerilla war or other form of asymmetric warfare. |
Those Whose Walls Already Rise | - | Make a map showing an alternate defensive wall, or other defensive fortifications. |
Thou Shalt be a Father of Many Nations | Divergence | Make a map showing a 'modern' world in which ancient Israel built an empire which at it's height was at least as large as the Achaemenid Persian empire from OTL. A descendant state should still exist, which at least thinks of its religion as that of the glory days, but does not need to be more than medium-sized. |
Three's Company | - | Make a map showing three neighboring colonies from three different countries, none of which have any other colonies in the region. |
Time of Legends | Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing the world before an apocalypse from the point of view of survivors from after the apocalypse. |
Tiny but Economically Prosperous! | Single country | Make a map showing an alternate microstate. |
To Infinity | - | Make a map set in the world of a comic book from an ATL. |
To New Lands! | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing an alternate Migration period. Ethnic groups in odd places is encouraged. Map can be set any time after the Migration period. |
To the Victor | Conflict | Make a map showing a pivotal battle. |
Together at Last | Single country | Make a map showing a nation that encompasses an entire ethnic group. |
Toxicity | Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing a world of rampant environmental collapse and destruction on larger scales than OTL. |
Transcontinental | - | Make a map showing a piece of infrastructure that reaches from one side of a continent to the other. |
Transition | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a state undergoing a change of identity in a way it did not undergo in OTL. An OTL example would be the Russian Revolution, in which Russia (at least officially) changed from a traditional empire into the nucleus of a global communist revolution. |
Truth without Error | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a world - or part of it - where the scientific method (or an equivalent) was first developed by a non-European culture. |
Unbounded Possibilities | Style | Make a map showing another timeline without showing any political boundaries. |
A Union Made to Hold | Single country | Make a map showing a supranational union that managed to survive a time of troubles. |
United we Stand, Divided we Are | Conflict, Single country | Make a map showing a violent breakup of a country. |
Unity Through A New Language | - | Make a map showing a map of a polity or region with a high degree of linguistic diversity that has adopted a non native and non-historic language as a unifying force; and example of this would be OTL India adopting French instead of English as a lingua franca. |
Uplifted | - | Make a map showing a world where a species of animal other than humans has gained sapience |
Upon Pillars of Salt and Pillars of Sand | Single country | Make a map showing an unstable nation on the verge of collapse. |
Urban Guerrilla Warfare | Conflict | Make a map showing a city plagued by guerilla warfare between different factions. |
Vascodagamia | - | Make a map showing a city, state, or region named after an explorer. |
Victory in defeat | Conflict | Make a map showing the results of a defeat in a conflict, the result of which ultimately strengthened the vanquished side with respect to the winner. |
Virulent | - | Make a map showing the extent of an epidemic. |
Völkerwanderung | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a mass migration and its effects. |
Wandering Religions | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing an area where a religion has established a local majority in a place that it seems completely out of place. |
The War No One Saw Coming | Conflict | Make a map showing a region or the world at the beginning, middle or right after a war that no one foresaw and/or thought possible. |
WTF or War The Fuck?! | Conflict | Make a map showing a region or the world right before, during or right after a war the origins of which are so ridiculous that future generations spend time trying to figure out what the real reasons for the war with as 'certainly, people wouldn't start a war over something like that right…right?'; an example IOTL would be the War of the Golden Stool. |
The War Unseen | Conflict | Make a map showing a region before and after a devastating war. |
Wars Worse Than Civil | Conflict | Make a map showing atrocities committed during a civil war. |
We Will We Will Rock You | Conflict, Single Country | Make a map showing a militaristic nation that frightens its neighbours. |
WHAT ARE THOSE!? | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a group of nations that are outstanding and envied by others. |
What's 9 +10? 21. | Single Country | Make a map showing a nation that's suffered due to an incompetent leader. |
Where the Smiles Died | - | Make a map showing a scenario where a single event drastically changed the regional or global situation. |
Why Me? | Conflict, Single Country | Make a map showing a country that is constantly tormented by other powers. |
The Wealth of Nations | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a world where the Industrial Revolution happened somewhere other than 18th-century Britain. The map can show either the progress of the actual revolution or the political ramifications of it. |
We Happy Few | Single country, Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing a country that actively misleads its population into believing things that are not true. |
We Shall All Hang Separately | Divergence | Make a map showing what happens when after independence the 13 colonies are unable to maintain a union between themselves, and instead go their separate ways as sovereign states. |
We, the Others | - | Make a map showing a state where government decisions are, at least ostensibly, not made by people but by some other entity. For example a theocratic state where government decisions are supposedly made by one or several divine beings, a state controlled by an AI, a country whose government makes decisions by chance (e.g. by flipping a coin), etc. |
We the People | Single country | Make a map showing a successful pan-nationalist movement. |
We're all going to die! | Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing the aftermath of a global disaster. You don't have to show the entire world, but the massive scale of the disaster should be apparent. |
We're running out of [X]! | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a society dependent on some resource which is now becoming critically hard to get. |
Weird Cola War | Social/Cultural | Make a map depicting the carbonated soda market from an alternate timeline. |
Weird Console War | Social/Cultural | Make a map depicting the video game market from from an alternate timeline. |
What Have We Done | - | Make a map showing the results of an action or event which seemed to be a good idea, but later turned out to have been a grave mistake. |
Where the Green Grass Grows | - | Make a map showing a national park, forest, or natural preserve. |
Where the Streets are Paved with Gold | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a region as it is perceived in another part of the world. |
Why Hello… | Conflict | Make a map showing a nation launching a surprise attack against another. |
With Great Power | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing a world where superheroes exist. |
The Womb of Nations | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a powerful tribe or group of tribes. |
The World Factbook | Style | Make a map showing the world from ATL textbook, encyclopedia, or atlas. |
The World in its Darkest Hour | Conflict | Make a map showing the world at what is commonly considered its lowest point. |
A World Made for Two! | Personal | Make a map showing a world that was altered due to a marriage that did not happen in OTL happening, or a marriage that did happen not happening. |
The World Turn'd Upside Down | Divergence | Make a map showing a world where most or all of the major powers are located in what is in OTL the third world. |
World Police | Conflict | Make a map showing a regional conflict or its aftermath where a superpower or world-spanning empire has militarily intervened. |
World With a Twist | FPS-ASB | Make a map of the world (or part of it) were land and sea have switched places. |
The Writing on the Wall | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing the effects of a book, essay, poem or song. |
The Yankee's Legacy | Personal | Make a map showing the long-term effects of a single person being ISOT- ed into a different time or place. |
You Are Now Exiting The Comfort Zone | Style | Make a map showing an area that you, as a mapmaker, have never explored in detail before. |
You Think I'd Really Fall for T— | Conflict | Make a map showing a surprise attack in the rear/periphery of an aggressive entity focused elsewhere. |
Zamenhof's Land | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a world, region, or country where an artificial language is spoken by a majority of the population. |
Used Challenges
Contest Round | Challenge Title | Category | Challenge text |
---|---|---|---|
MotF 1 | Steampunk/Clockpunk | Style, FPS-ASB | Make a map showing a steampunk / clockpunk world or region. |
MotF 2 | Decolonised Africa | - | Make a map showing either the whole or part of the continent of Africa during or after the process of decolonisation. |
MotF 3 | Averted Peninsular War | Divergence | Make a map showing the world 90 years after Napoleon failed to install his brother on the Spanish throne, averting the Peninsular War. |
MotF 4 | The Paranormal | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing something paranormal. |
MotF 5 | Cold War: UK vs. US | Conflict | Make a map showing a cold war between the United States of America and the United Kingdom. |
MotF 6 | Industrialised Southern Song | Divergence, Single country | Make a map showing the results of industrialisation by the Southern Song Dynasty. |
MotF 7 | The Fall of the Conquistador's Empire | Divergence | Make a map showing the successor states to the Cortezian Empire after the Great Revolt of 1788-1793. |
MotF 8 | Disbanded North American Viceroyality | Divergence | Make a map showing the situation either before or after the disbandment of the Vicroyality of North America, including various sub-divisions such as Princely States, Protected Nations, Royal Colonies. |
MotF 9 | Alternate partition of the Ottoman Empire | Divergence | Make a map showing the Middle East at least twenty years after an alternate partitioning of the Ottoman Empire at the end of World War One. |
MotF 10 | THE REVOLUTION HAS FAILED! | Conflict | Make a map showing the aftermath of a failed revolution. |
MotF 11 | March Across Attica | Conflict, Divergence | Make a map showing the results of the Persians winning at the Battle of Marathon and ultimately triumphing against Greece. |
MotF 12 | WHAT ONCE WAS OURS… | Single country | Make a map showing the irredentist claims of a country in an AH scenario. |
MotF 13 | ALL ABOARD! | - | Make a map showing an ATL transport network. |
MotF 14 | THE KING IS DEAD! | Personal | Make a map showing the events leading up to, the moment of, or the aftermath of a king or other sovereign being killed, deposed, or rendered unable to rule in some way. |
MotF 15 | Long After The End… | Apocalyptic/Dystopian, Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a post-apocalyptic Earth or part of a post-apocalyptic Earth where society has redeveloped along different cultural and technological lines. |
MotF 16 | The Caliphate of Rûm | Divergence, Single country | Make a map showing an Islamic nation that either has reforged or is on its way to reforging Rome's once great empire. |
MotF 17 | May God Have Mercy On My Enemies | Conflict, Personal | Make a map showing the world or a part of it in a world where a military genius, who was not born in our world, was born and brought a nation to victory over another. |
MotF 18 | I Am Become Death | Conflict, FPS-ASB | Make a map showing the world, or a part of it, after the USA or another powerful state (Russia/USSR, Britain, Germany etc.) developed The Ultimate Weapon. |
MotF 19 | IN ABSENTIA | Divergence | Make a map showing showing an equivalent to the Roman Empire, where the OTL Empire either never existed or never grew to the prominence it did in our timeline. |
MotF 20 | Through A Glass, Darkly | - | Make a map showing an AH as imagined by a person in an AH. |
MotF 21 | VOX POPULI | - | Make a map showing one or several plebiscites or referenda, the purpose of which is to decide whether the region being polled will become part of one nation or another. |
MotF 22 | The Mouse That Roared | Conflict | Make a map showing a world where one nation managed to ultimately succeed over a significantly superior foe in war. |
MotF 23 | Welcome to the DMZ | Conflict | Make a map showing a demilitarised zone (DMZ). |
MotF 24 | Nothing Lasts Forever | Single country | Make a map showing a country which has existed continuously for at least a century, but whose government and organisation has changed so significantly over the intervening time that it is almost unrecognisable. |
MotF 25 | TO SALTED EARTH, THROUGH BURNING SKY | Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing a depressing and dystopian world. It may be a sparse, post-apocalyptic wasteland, or a world of oppressive, impersonal authority. |
MotF 26 | Guns, Germs and Steel | Divergence | Make a map showing a world where Europe did not achieve global domination. |
MotF 27 | Over Mountain, Plain and Sea | - | Make a map showing a world where a major trade route existed where none existed in OTL, or where a relatively minor trade route from OTL is made much more popular and important. |
MotF 28 | Sons of Chaos | Conflict | Make a map showing an ATL terrorist network. |
MotF 29 | Our God is a Jealous God | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing the spread of an ATL religion (this can be a religion that did not exist in OTL, a sect of an OTL religion that did not exist in OTL, or an OTL religion or sect that is vastly different to how it is in OTL). |
MotF 30 | The Ministry of Truth | Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing the world as it is depicted to the people of a 1984-esque totalitarian state by their government, then make another map showing how the world actually is. |
MotF 31 | All You Can Annex Buffet | Conflict | Make a map showing a harsh peace treaty that has been imposed on the losing side of a war. |
MotF 32 | Never Again | Conflict | Make a map showing all or part of a war from the point of view of someone from 10 years before the war starts. |
MotF 33 | The Pilgrimage | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a pilgrimage route and/or the holy sites of a certain religion in an alternate timeline. |
MotF 34 | Dancing with the Devil | - | Make a map showing an uneasy alliance between a generally free, democratic nation and a generally repressive, autocratic nation. |
MotF 35 | Natio Vetus, Gloria Nova | - | Make a map showing a nation that is either attempting to revive or recreate a long dead empire or that considers itself to be the cultural or spiritual successor of a long dead empire. |
MotF 36 | They Arrived | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing the world sometime after aliens arrive. Whether their arrival is peaceful and scientific, an unwanted stranding, or an aggressive invasion of Earth does not matter. |
MotF 37 | Melting Pot | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing ethnic, racial or national heritage in a “nation of immigrants”. |
MotF 38 | The Not French Revolution | Conflict | Make a map showing a world where a revolution analogous to the French Revolution from OTL in ideals and/or circumstances takes place in a country that is not France. |
MotF 39 | A People out of Place | - | Make a map showing an ethnic group that has moved out of its place of origin and is now primarily located elsewhere. |
MotF 40 | Castles Made of Sand | - | Make a map showing the decline of a once mighty empire. |
MotF 41 | Gold! | - | Make a map showing the aftermath or effects of a rush for a resource (such as gold or oil) in a region. |
MotF 42 | Mostly Harmless | FPS-ASB | Make a map showing the world from the point of view of alien onlookers. |
MotF 43 | PUNK'S NOT DEAD | Style | Make a map showing a “punkified” version of a particular era, with the cliches, fears, hopes and prognostications of that era surviving to some extent past their time. |
MotF 44 | The North-South Divide | Conflict | Make a map showing a Cold War-style ideological conflict between two equal power blocs, one based in the northern hemisphere and one in the south. |
MotF 45 | Alternate Soviet Union | - | Make a map showing a super-power level socialist state. |
MotF 46 | A New (FillInNation) | - | Make a map showing a self-governing settler colony. |
MotF 47 | If Death Had Come Later | Personal, Conflict | Make a map showing the effects of a great conqueror living longer. |
MotF 48 | Blink and You'll Miss It | Single country | Make a map showing a short-lived state or a region in transition. |
MotF 49 | For the game, for the world | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a sports competition (or something directly related to a sports competition) from an alternate world. |
MotF 50 | Fifty Years is a Long Time | - | Make a map showing any scenario, then another map showing fifty years later. |
MotF 51 | The Map and the Mirror | - | Make a map showing a scenario which is an ironic reverse of OTL. |
MotF 52 | Weird World War I | Conflict | Make a map showing a world war from an alternate timeline which is radically different to our own in some manner. |
MotF 53 | The Benevolent Co-Prosperity Sphere | Conflict | Make a map showing a world where a former regional underdog has gained the upper hand and is now imposing its will on its weaker neighbours. |
MotF 54 | If I Ran The Zoo | Personal | Make a map showing the ideal world of a historical figure. |
MotF 55 | The Wild, Wild… | - | Make a map showing a frontier region where the authority of organized states is thin. |
MotF 56 | The True Believers | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a world where a religion that became a major religion in OTL remains or becomes minor and restricted to a small area. |
MotF 57 | My Name is Ozymandias | - | Make a map showing an extinct country or civilisation from the perspective of archaeologists studying its ruins. |
MotF 58 | Natural Philosophies | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing the results of an alternate scientific revolution that took place at a different time and/or at a different place than the one in OTL. |
MotF 59 | The Indomitables | - | Make a map showing a state which has managed to retain its independence in a region divided between colonial powers, or how the state's independence affects the broader geopolitical situation. |
MotF 60 | L'État, C'est Moi | Personal | Make a map showing the world or a part of it following the successes of a monarch who was unsuccessful in our timeline. |
MotF 61 | The Petting Zoo | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a world in which an animal that was domesticated in our timeline was not domesticated, or an animal that was not domesticated in our timeline was. |
MotF 62 | Let Us Not Be Deceived | Conflict, Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a “Cold War” scenario where one or both of the participants are following an ideology other than Communism or Liberal Democracy (i.e. the ideologies of the USSR and USA respectively during the Cold War of OTL). |
MotF 63 | Those Strange Tongues | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing the linguistic geography of a region that is dominated by a language or language family which did not exist in OTL, or which did not dominate that region in OTL. |
MotF 64 | Air, Water, Earth, Fire | - | Make a map showing the effects of an alternate history natural disaster. |
MotF 65 | The Miracle | Single country, Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a nation that has achieved an economic miracle and become an advanced economy that did not do so in OTL. |
MotF 66 | The Gun Is Our Government | - | Make a map showing a supposedly anarchic or stateless region, showing the people and organisations that hold actual power in the region. |
MotF 67 | Neither Istanbul nor Constantinople | Divergence | Make a map showing a world where the city on the Golden Horn - currently known in OTL as Istanbul - is widely known by a name other than Istanbul or Constantinople. |
MotF 68 | A Mile Between, A World Away | Conflict | Make a map showing a region where two opposed major powers share a border. |
MotF 69 | ALL ABOARD! 2 | - | Make a map showing an ATL transport network. |
MotF 70 | The People's Choice | - | Make a map showing a vote (election, referendum, plebiscite, etc.) that is highly controversial or outright rigged. |
MotF 71 | The Maps are Never Right in Those Books | Style | Make a map showing a map of an ATL that is incorrect. |
MotF 72 | The Eye of the World | Conflict | Make a map showing a seemingly stagnant, long-running and high profile conflict in an alternate timeline. |
MotF 73 | Off the Map | - | Make a map showing a country that has a government and controls territory but isn't universally recognized as a state. |
MotF 74 | In the Wake of Giants | - | Make a map showing the aftermath of the decline of a large empire, powerful civilisation, or major international organisation. |
MotF 75 | The Little Country that Could | Conflict | Make a map showing a war or the events surrounding a war (e.g. the events leading up to it or the aftermath) where one nation managed to ultimately succeed over a superior foe. |
MotF 76 | Meet the New Boss | - | Make a map showing a country that existed in OTL ruling a region that it did not rule in OTL. |
MotF 77 | On the Road Again | Personal | Make a map showing the travels of one person or a small group of people in an alternate timeline. |
MotF 78 | The Name of the Game | Style | Make a map showing a map that is used for a board game in an alternate timeline. |
MotF 79 | The Empire Under the Sun | Single country | Make a map showing the largest country in the world at its largest extent. |
MotF 80 | Risorgimento | Single country | Make a map showing an alternate national unification. |
MotF 81 | This Land is Ours | Conflict | Make a map showing an alternate territorial dispute. |
MotM 1 | In the Course of Human Events | Single country | Make a map showing a successful independence movement. |
MotF 82 | The Candle that Burns Twice as Bright | Single country | Make a map showing a great but short-lived empire. |
MotF 83 | Atop a Throne of Skulls | Conflict | Make a map showing the details or effects of a huge loss of human life that was caused by human action. |
MotF 84 | And There was Peace in the Kingdom | Conflict | Make a map showing a formerly war-torn region, that is now peaceful and stable. |
MotF 85 | A New Beginning | - | Make a map showing the results of the first election in a country after a long period of undemocratic government. |
MotF 86 | The Pen is Mightier | Conflict, Divergence | Make a map showing a world where a conflict that happened in our timeline, or in the canon of a fantasy/sci-fi world, was avoided peacefully through diplomacy. |
MotF 87 | Smells Like Team Spirit | - | Make a map showing a geographic distribution of sports teams. |
MotF 88 | Public Enemy Number One | - | Make a map showing a state that is considered to be an international pariah. |
MotF 89 | In My Benevolent Shade | - | Make a map showing a country's system of client states. |
MotF 90 | Not Built in a Day | Single country | Make a map showing the territorial evolution of a country. |
MotF 91 | Irredenta! | Single country | Make a map showing the territorial aspirations of a country, or a political, ethnic, or similar group. |
MotF 92 | My Thousand Masks | - | Make a map showing a number of overlapping international organisations. |
MotF 93 | Making a Mark on the Map | - | Make a map showing an artificially created landmass or body of water. |
MotF 94 | This is Planet Earth | - | Make a map showing one of the initial stages of a worldwide unification. |
MotF 95 | Ab Urbe Condita | - | Make a map showing one or several city states. |
MotF 96 | Just in Case | Conflict | Make a map showing a country's war plan. |
MotF 97 | The Conqueror | Single country, Personal | Make a map showing an empire built through the efforts of a single person. |
MotF 98 | Greener Pastures | - | Make a map showing a legal discrepancy between countries that prompts related border traffic. |
MotF 99 | The Dust Has Settled | Conflict | Make a map showing the world or a continent before and after a World War. |
MotF 100 | The Centenary | - | Make a map showing the 100th anniversary of an event. |
MotF 101 | Diaspora | Social/Cutural | Make a map showing a population that has moved from its original homeland. |
MotM 2 | A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words | - | Make a full timeline, and a map illustrating that timeline. |
MotF 102 | The Last Straw | - | Make a map showing the details or effects of a single deliberate action that leads to immediate and far-reaching political ramifications. |
MotF 103 | Sunshine and Lollipops | - | Make a map showing a utopia. |
MotF 104 | Mind the Gap | - | Make a map showing an urban rail system. |
MotF 105 | The Weak Suffer What They Must | - | Make a map showing a forced population transfer or its aftereffects. |
MotF 106 | Maps in the Mirror | - | Make a map showing a scenario from an ATL which is, in some manner, the ironic reverse of a scenario from OTL. |
MotF 107 | The Locked Country | - | Make a map showing a country which has isolated itself from the rest of the world. |
MotF 108 | Seasons of Discontent | - | Make a map showing the aftermath of a period of rapid climate change. |
MotF 109 | Puzzling States of America | Divergence, Single country | Make a map showing the United States of America with alternate internal borders. |
MotF 110 | Danse Macabre | - | Make a map of the aftermath of a pandemic. |
MotF 111 | There's Gold in Them There Hills | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing the aftermath or effects of a rush for a resource (such as gold or oil) in a region. |
MotF 112 | The Tail Wagging the Dog | - | Make a map showing a union between multiple countries within which a previously subordinate country has become dominant, and the previously dominant country has become subordinate. |
MotF 113 | Tickled Punk! | Style | Make a map showing a “punkified” world, where the technology and culture of a specific era has survived and become exaggerated. |
MotF 114 | From Sea to Sea | Single country | Make a map showing a country that borders two major bodies of water. |
MotF 115 | Weird World War II | Conflict, Divergence | Make a map showing the second world war in an alternate timeline which is radically different from our own Second World War in some manner. |
MotF 116 | Between a Rock and a Hard Place | Single country | Make a map showing a buffer state. |
MotF 117 | False Friends | - | Make a map showing a place, event, organisation, or similar thing from an ATL that shares a name - but little else - with a place or event from OTL. |
MotF 118 | The Pale Continent | Divergence | Make a map showing all or part of Europe in a timeline where it was colonised by countries from another region. |
MotF 119 | Blink and You'll Miss It 2 | Single country | Make a map showing a short-lived state or a region in transition. |
MotF 120 | Let's Go A-Viking | Single country | Make a map showing a state founded by Vikings. |
MotF 121 | The Promised Land | Social/Cultural | Make a map of a voluntary mass settlement. |
MotF 122 | And the Meek Shall Inherit the Earth | Social/Cultural, Single country | Make a map showing a nation of long oppressed people who have achieved independence in their own nationstate. |
MotM 3 | Encyclopedia Cartographica | Style, MotM | Make an encyclopedia article for a country, province, international organisation or similar entity. |
MotF 123 | Bricks and Marble | - | Make a map showing an alternate city or an alternate version of an OTL city. |
MotF 124 | On the Shoulders of Giants | Apocalyptic/Dystopian | Make a map showing the world or part of it where society has redeveloped following an apocalyptic event. |
MotF 125 | HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE, BATMAN! | - | Make a map showing a continent or region that is very politically diverse and fragmented. |
MotF 126 | Nix the Notion of the Nation | - | Make a map showing a significantly influential sovereign political entity that is not a nation state. |
MotF 127 | This Too Shall Pass | Social/Cultural | Make a map showing a region during two different periods - one a golden age of progress and power, the other a dark age of regression and chaos. |