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15.8 Dynamic Maps: Pins, Shapes, and Labels
15.0 World & Region Maps 15.8 Dynamic Maps: Pins, Shapes, and Labels

Everything you put on a dynamic map is a feature. There are five kinds you can draw, and they all share the same editor, the same colours, and the same linking.

The five feature types
  • Pin — a marker at an exact point, with an optional icon and label. For settlements, dungeons, landmarks, anything that lives in one spot.
  • Area — a freeform polygon. For kingdoms, forests, contested ground, areas of effect.
  • Line — an open path. For roads, rivers, borders, trade routes, the path the party actually walked.
  • Box — a rectangle. A quicker way to block out a region when precision doesn't matter.
  • Text — a plain text label placed directly on the map, with no marker. For naming a mountain range or an ocean across the picture itself.
Drawing something
  1. In the Map Tools card, under Add, click the tool you want: Pin, Area, Line, Box, or Text.
  2. Draw on the map. A pin is a single click; areas and lines are a click per point; a box is a drag.
  3. The feature saves as soon as you finish drawing. A new text label opens its editor straight away so you can type the text.
  4. Click Select to go back to normal panning and clicking.

The Select tool is worth knowing about: while any drawing tool is active, clicking a feature draws rather than opening it. If clicking a pin isn't showing you its details, you probably still have a tool switched on.

Changing something you have drawn

Under Edit in the same card:

  • Reshape — drag the individual points of an area or line to redraw its edges.
  • Move — drag whole features to a new position.
  • Delete — click features to remove them. The cursor changes to a red trash icon so you know the mode is live.

And if you get it wrong, Undo and Redo sit alongside. They cover drawing, deleting, and moving, so an accidental delete is recoverable as long as you undo before you leave the page.

Undo does not survive the page. The undo history is held while you have the map open. Once you navigate away or refresh, it is gone, and a deleted feature is gone with it. If you have just deleted something by mistake, undo it before you do anything else.
Editing a feature's details

Click a feature to open its popup, then click Edit. The editor gives you:

  • Label — the name shown on the map. Up to 120 characters, and optional. Pin labels sit permanently under the pin; area and line labels appear when you hover.
  • Notes — a rich text field, shown to anyone who opens the feature.
  • Color — nine swatches: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink, grey, and white. The colour sets both the outline and the fill.
  • Icon — pins only. Pick from your campaign's icon set, with a filter box to search it, or choose No icon for a plain marker.
  • Links — connections to campaign content. See 15.9.
  • Secret? — Game Masters only. See 15.11.

The green save button names what you are saving — Save Pin, Save Area, and so on. Delete at the bottom left removes the feature entirely.

Colour is your legend. With nine swatches and no built-in key, colour is the fastest way to make a busy map readable — one colour per faction, or per terrain type, or per "safe / contested / hostile". Whatever scheme you pick, write it into the map's Notes so your players can decode it without asking.
Pins are for points, areas are for territory, text is for names. The most common mistake is using a labelled pin where a text label would read better. If the thing you are marking is a region rather than a place — a mountain range, a sea, a duchy — a text label sitting across it looks like a real map. A pin in the middle of it looks like a dropped marker.
15.0 World & Region Maps