Lit The Essential Atlas and Galactic Cartography: Official Discussion

Yeah, the Cartoon Network site took the entire Star Wars section down. Which really bugs me, since it had a bit of original info in its mini-Databank.

 

Modi: In SQ, that is the sector the OF stops in between their Glythe and Kokash stops; that just means its SOMEwhere between them, not that it borders both, so it need not be that long

 

I would love to see a exact placing for Ord Pardron. During the Thrawn crisis, it was a key New Republic base, as well as home to the local NR sector fleet. It is apparently near Ando, but I don't think we know the size of the Dufilvian Sector.

Same goes for Condre and other planets in that area.

--Adm. Nick

 

I'm trying to find the Atrivis Sector , also called the Generis Sector but I can't find it anywhere on nav-computer.com. I know it's in the Outer Rim bu that's about all.

Where is it near? Despayre and Mantooine are there along with Iridium and Atisa.

 

Damn it. I wanted to check if my notes on the Unknown Regions are orrect
[image=http://img153.imageshack.us/img153/1799/ur2rh6.jpg]

It's gone and I have been looking for that map for a year...

Thanks, sounds logical.
And what about Vision of the Future, what states, that Unknown Regions is 75% of the DISK? Anyway, what was the first source that identified the UR as part of the disk?

 

Maybe you are right, I was overcomplicating...

Ord Pardron is probably near the Dufilvian/Abrion Sectors border.

It's in L5 on my map, or you can use the index. Senator_Cilghal placed Despayre, Mantooine, Iridium and Atrisia on the Northeast quadrant map.

 

Thanks, it's saved me from an Obi and Kamino moment

 

You know what we need? We need a 3-D galaxy map. That's be sweet. And a thousand times more accurate.

 

Last good map was the one included in Insider a few years back.
Def. time for an update.

 

The one included in the New Essential Chronology was pretty good...

 

about 3D...

maybe Hutt space and imperial/republic territory is overlapping.. like hutts in middle and above and below republic space? this might explain some placement inconsistencies of member worlds within hutt space.

same for core worlds, etc. and outer rim. there is a outer rim above the core, like the inofficial map shows nice. and if we assume that that is possible, we could draw some hypothetical heigth distances from the sources we have by using these originally misplaced worlds now as heigth indicators in relation to their known neighbours and the closeness to them. possible but much work, right?

 

When were the Unknown Regions ever not part of the disk?

Though not labeled, the Unknown Regions were present on the very first SW galactic map (1998's Behind the Magic), in the galaxy's western half.

I used Behind the Magic as my starting point when drawing up the New Jedi Order maps, and knew right off the bat we weren't going to achieve Zahn's "75% of the disk" stat from Vision of the Future. At most, the Unknown Regions were around 40%. But that didn't stop me from trying, with plenty of rationalizations along the lines of, "if you took the primary Unknown Regions, plus pockets of unknown space in the eastern half, plus Wild Space, plus some other stuff, you might get pretty close to 75%."

When the NJO map was officially drawn by Chris Barbieri, the galaxy was "tilted" toward the perspective of the viewer, making the UR look even smaller than it had on my overhead-perspective map. Maybe it was this factor that led to the "15% of the disk" statement in Force Heretic.

I should scan that early, overhead map drawn during NJO planning (done in pen and ink, with white-out smudges all over it). You guys would get a kick out of it.

Click here for more details on the early maps, taken from my 2002 recap of the process for the Star Wars Insider.

Dan

 

I'm still of the opinion that the Unknown Regions should be located above and below the plane of the eliptic, in the galactic halo. It allows them to be huge volume-wise and makes more sense for them to be largely unexplored.

 

Given that faster-than-light travel is easy for the inhabitants of the GFFA, I'd disagree that it makes more sense for a "galactic halo" Unknown Regions to be more "unknown" than an "in-disk" Unknown Regions. Either way, you have to invent a reason why people don't just fire up their hyperdrives and explore it.

Hyperspace anomalies come in handy here, and they can work wherever.

Dan

 

I find the whole idea of "Unknown Regions" existing at all offensive to the movies. When Obi-Wan was asking Jocasta Nu about Kamino, did she say "oh, that must be in the Unknown Regions" when she couldn't find it? No. Because there's no such thing, as far as AotC is concerned. Same thing with searching for Grievous in RotS.

Gives me a headache.

Anyway, this is why the UR being not part of the galaxy per se (i.e. not part of the disk) is better, IMO. Jedi Archives are comprehensive in the galaxy, but not extra-galactically. Why? Hyperspace anomalies, etc etc, whatever works

 

There was a point, when the UR existed in the EU without description about it's placement. Am I wrong? I didn't say that there was a source what stated that it is not part of the disk, I was just asking about the first time when it was stated that it is part of the dsik. Was it Vision of the Future then?

Please, I would really like to see it.

You mentioned here that there is Core Worlds map in Adventure Journal. Am I misinterpreting something or I missed it?

Also how should we treat the Rimma Trade Route map from Lords of Expanse and the Slice map from the WEG rulebook? Parts of them aren't accurate anymore (region/sector borders, trade routes). Are they considered to be rough sketches now?

 

In AotC, Obi-Wan asked for a planet on the other side of the Galaxy from the UR, and Jocasta knew that it wasn't the issue. In RotS, the Jedi had no reason to beleive that the Separatists had suddenly found hyperlanes into the UR and Grevious had nothing to gain by separating himself from his troops.
Nothing in the movies confirms or denies the existance of the UR.


/Charlii

 

I'm not sure I can really answer the question, as the Unknown Regions were created by West End Games along with regions such as the Colonies and the Mid-Rim. The regions were established to divide the galaxy into comprehensible territories. The galaxy was the playing field -- the idea that the Unknown Regions would exist somewhere else entirely was kind of foreign to that intent.

The first time I saw the Unknown Regions proposed as a "galactic halo" was on Curtis Saxton's technical commentaries in the late '90s, but by that time official maps had already been created detailing how the UR fit into the galactic disk.

There's a map of the Ringali Shell in Paul Sudlow's article "Into the Core Worlds" from Adventure Journal #7. Click here for a map that appears to be based on it.

Well, the Rimma route from Lords of the Expanse was supposed to be imported as accurately as possible, but even back in the early stages I remember having problems with Sluis Van and Dagobah. In general, I would recommend treating each new map as if it were the latest & greatest (except in the case of obvious typos or egregious errors), even if that means overriding a previous map placement.

Dan

 

The Slice was also created by West and Games and they stated that it contains 1000 settled worlds and represents only 1% of the Known Galaxy. The idea that it would contain almost the entire eastern quadrant was probably foreign to that intent.
WEG treated the Sectors in different way than we treat it now either. (I wrote about this here.)

The Truce at Bakura Sourcebook ('96) placed the Ssi-ruuk in a globular cluster suggesting that it's in tha halo, however i don't know when was it estabilished that the Ssi-ruuk star cluster is in the UR.

Oh, that. Thanks. I thought that it is an original map, but then it's the same map what appeared in The Far Orbit Project, right?
EDIT: Oops, it seems that Adventure Journal came earlier than The Far Orbit Project...
[image=http://img54.imageshack.us/img54/4745/farorbitringaliee0.jpg]

Where is Dagobah on those maps? Sorry for the niggling.
[image=http://img178.imageshack.us/img178/9576/rimmabf4.jpg]

Well, Leland Chee said that they don't treat it that way. What should I do with the "errors" on the latest galaxy map then (Dark Horse poster)? I counted 14 differences from the priveous maps (you can find the list in my 8/2 6:47am post. For example is Colomus Columus? (Colomus was also on the NEC map)

 

Hmmm... the RPG is coming back next March with a new core rulebook, which is set to include a "World Gazetteer." Also, WotC says they have some other supplements planned...

(GamingReport.com has a video of WotC's GenCon presentation.)

 

True. I considered WEG's "Slice = 1% of the galaxy" stat, but ultimately ignored it. I simply couldn't make it work with my starting info, which included the placements of most movie planets (Behind the Magic) and other known info about the Slice (such as a list of Slice planets...AJ #10?). The current size of the Slice is definitely a case of new information overriding old information.

True. I'd still view the WEG definition as "correct in many cases," but modify it to be flexible enough to account for modern definitions of scale & scope.

My original hand-drawn map had a blobby "Ssi-Ruuk Star Cluster" just outside one of the spiral arms, but in subsequent official maps it gradually moved into the disk proper. It's all good, as a globular cluster can exist inside a galactic disk.

Dagobah is in the Sluis sector. And because we already knew the position of Dagobah (from Behind the Magic), it meant I had to draw the Rimma at approximately a 6:00 position. Which involved some fudging, since the Rimma lined up rather poorly against regional borders... if I remember correctly, Eriadu became a real headache here as well.

If what I say is ever in conflict with what Leland says, go with Leland.

That said, I read the post that you linked to, and I think Leland and I are both saying the same thing, i.e. new maps are definitive except where they contain screw-ups. (Yeah, I know, how can you tell which are screw-ups and which are intentional resettings of planetary placements?)

"Colomus" is almost certainly Columus. The other ones I don't know, and I don't yet possess a copy of the DHC map (so it might be a while before I can pitch in).

Dan

 

Dan, Modi, Carty, etc.:

I am rereading Planet of Twilight, and some interesting info therein!

1. Atraken is apparently between Meridian Sector and Coruscant

2. Nam Chorios is in middle of Meridian Sector

3. Durren is the nearest NR world to Nam Chorios WITHIN Meridian Sector; next closest from there is Cybloc XII, also within Meridian Sector.

4. Cybloc XII is between Nam Chorios and Coruscant.

5. At a hyperspace transition point between Durren and Nam Chorios, the droids are captured by a pirate, who takes them in a direction NOT toward Cybloc, but after 1 hour has taken them OUTSIDE Meridian Sector to another hyperspace transition point from which he plans to take them to Celanon!

6. At this point, R2 makes him turn around the ship and go back inside the Sector to the nearest NR world, Nim Drovis.

These clues may give some idea where Atraken, Celanon, and the Celanon Spur are!

 

Incorrect-

"Perhaps the archives are incomplete?" (if Obi-Wan knew of the UR as understood by some, this would be a nonsensical question- they'd be incomplete by definition)

"If a planet is not in our archives, it does not exist."

Very simple and explicit. Not "it must be in the unknown regions" or any such thing. There *are* *no* uncharted planets, like those supposedly in these "unknown regions", as far as she's concerned.

It's not the EU's fault that AotC came out after they thought it up, but still, it's quite clear. Therefore, it is best to place the UR out of the galactic disk proper. AotC > EU.

 

Why? As Dan said, why would it be harder to travel outside the disk than within it? Why would these not be considered to "exist"?

As I said, both Obi-Wan and Jocasta know their basic galactic cartography. Jocasta doesn't need to ask if the planet could be in the unknown regions or otherwise unexplored, because in that case he wouldn't have asked her about it. This is a planet that is known in the Republic and located in a well-charted part of the Galaxy, that is why they are both confused. There is no continuity error here.



/Charlii

 

Dan: In COPL, Han remembers he and Leia fought in a battle on Mindar. Judging by the time Han says the battle was, I calculated this was the same time as the Battle of Mindor in your Chronology. It was evident these battles were the same, but the folks on Wikia want to be certain that Mindor and Mindar are the same; please confirm!