# Community Participation > Mapping Challenge Suggestions >  Finish what someone else started

## Straf

This will take some thought and may possibly be another 2 monther.

The participants each start a map and work on it for a given period. Then, what they have started is passed on to another participant either on a partner basis or on a rotational basis. I like the partner basis where two people swap maps (so long as there's an even number) but nobody knows who their partner is until the end of the first phase. The other option is to pass your map to the person sat at the left, so to speak. i.e. you have 7 people in the challenge. Number 1 passes to number 2, who passes their to number 3, etc. until number 7 passes to number 1.

I don't know how the compass would be awarded - that's a headache for the CLs to work out  :Razz:

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## Azélor

That could be fun but also very complicated considering that we are not using the same software (and what about hand drawn maps?). 
Still, it could be done if the participants are paired correctly.

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## Redrobes

I voted no but I like the idea but I can tell you that if you take stuff and have to hand it off then someone or many will bail on the challenge and leave the other half high and dry,

But... I think theres loads of maps here that are unfinished and we could collect up many of them put them into a pile and say: Pick any one of these and finish it off. That I think would make a great challenge.

I just dont think its possible to have a challenge where more than one person is required to finish it.

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## Mouse

You could have my current Challenge entry if you wanted a spare unfinished map? - a version without the dark shadow and the text, so its just a background with the border, or you can keep the text if you want...

(I've lost my way with it)

The other thing is - there needs to be a way to upload the actual GIMP/PS/CC3/KRITA (or whatever) original unfinished map so that the person who takes it up  from that point would have the actual thing... or are you thinking of just using flattened jpg images of the thing?

EDIT: I haven't voted here because the option I would prefer isn't on the list - that of doing as Red suggested and using abandoned unfinished maps with the consent of the originator.  I didn't want to vote 'no' because I think its workable, and would be an interesting challenge  :Smile:

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## Straf

> I voted no but I like the idea but I can tell you that if you take stuff and have to hand it off then someone or many will bail on the challenge and leave the other half high and dry,
> 
> But... I think theres loads of maps here that are unfinished and we could collect up many of them put them into a pile and say: Pick any one of these and finish it off. That I think would make a great challenge.
> 
> I just dont think its possible to have a challenge where more than one person is required to finish it.


There are many practical hazards (I'm having real vocabulary problems at the moment!) with this idea, but the CLs have this knack of taking even just the seed of an idea and developing it into something workable. Anything collaborative is fraught with unreliability though so yeah maybe this idea is dumb considering the level of collaboration required.

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## Falconius

I'm with Redrobes, forget the collaboration, all of us have unfinished projects, perhaps a call could go out for people to volunteer some unfinished maps and gather a collection of about 5 or 10 interesting starts and then say "finish one of these maps."  That way people have a whole month and no collab issues.

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## Redrobes

I have the feeling that there would be no shortage of people with a half finished map who could get it all finished up for them - esp having some of the top mappers here hit with their talent. If I had a half finished map I was making for some adventure then id submit it - heck, id almost imagine some people *starting* and deliberately not finishing a map so that it could be finished off on free commission. Ideally tho, we should try to find some threads of people who have already submitted maps or who have dropped out of previous challenges.

And obviously you cant work on your own half finished map...

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## ThomasR

Maybe have someone do a rough sketch that everybody taking part in the challenge has to further. nobody will suspect a CL of having a map done with hidden motives.

Or redo the twin commission challenge, I'd love to do one of those.

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## Falconius

> Maybe have someone do a rough sketch that everybody taking part in the challenge has to further. nobody will suspect a CL of having a map done with hidden motives.


That's a challenge that occurs with a fair amount of frequency.  Not sure if it's really the same thing.  I see a half finished map as something far more developed than that, thus it would have different constraints and possibilities.  Although everyone doing the same half finished map instead of options could be an interesting possibility too.

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## Redrobes

I agree with Falconius. What I like about this idea is that the original mapper genuinely got stuck at that point and it would be interesting to see how seasoned mappers go from that point to completion. Just starting with some bare outline doesnt really exercise the point about taking it further. If someone took a half completed map and then junked most of it to completion then thats no good either. What I want to see is the half finished map right there in the final but with all the extras done to it that makes it good.

Occasionally I look at little you tube clips of these great artists rendering some scene - maybe thats fantasy or maybe scifi or maybe just portrait. One thing that keeps coming up is that there is a point in their process (usually quite early on for me...) that I would think - yeah Id be happy at that point and Id stop. But no, they carry on and render what I think are loads more unneccessary steps only with each one it gets better and better until their result is almost photo real and I think that I could never have done that. I dont have the eye to know what I would have fiddled with to take it further beyond the point I would have stopped. Now maybe that same thing is going on in the unfinished maps. Maybe they are stuck and just dont know where to go with it.

Its been a little dissapointing with the guild city maps. Some people finished theirs ages ago and then went on and completed a second sector. Others barely got into it and then ran aground. Id like for there to be more completed maps. I dont understand why someone would start a map and not complete it. I can perfectly understand why it doesnt come out to the level of expectation of how good it should be but many maps are nowhere near to that point. Also, some people go on to start more maps in the threads so its not a time constraints issue. Either they are stuck or just bored with this particular map.

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## Straf

Or developing the skills to carry on with them  :Wink: 

Unfortunately my WIP is stuck on the hard disk in my knackered PC. I actually intended on restarting my Guildcity map and putting into practice some of the new things I've learnt.

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## ladiestorm

As much as I like the idea, you may end up excluding some of your members who would normally participate.  I, for example, would not be able to 'finish' some one else's map, UNLESS it was someone that uses cc3+, AND if that some one had included their fcw in the thread, AND if I had all of the annuals they were working with.  I could also 'finish' a map made in Fractal Terrains, but again, only if I had the ftw.  

Hand drawn maps, or maps made in any other digital format, I wouldn't be able to 'finish'.  I would have to recreate them.  Which would be importing a traceable image into my program, then hand tracing each element of the map, using what symbol sets I have at my disposal.  That's not the same thing as finishing a map.

Now if you included an option to recreate someone else's unfinished map, and THEN complete it... I, and others like me that have a non - compatible program would be able to take part.

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