For a time now I am thinking about campaigns to give battles more 'meaning'. I have read Henry Hydes book about 'Wargaming Campains' and the 'Napoleonic Companion' from Baccus, so the rules are not really a problem - but the maps are! I can find historical maps in the Internet or in books, but they usualy have two problems: not enough information about the landscapes (especially hills and woods) and too much informations that are confusing (every little town with a name near it). It is of course possible to rework these maps with the computer, but that is a lot of work and I'm not really good with these kind of programs.

Is there anywhere a source of useful maps for wargaming? Knowing how much work it is to make maps I'm quite willing to pay for it. Or may it be a new line of products for Bacccus?

Cheers, Ralf

Is there any particular area you had in mind? or period? or specifc campaign?

Two in the moment: 1809 french-austrian war, that is a very well defined area alongside the danube. The other one is ACW, well, thats a lot of space...

I think maps are a difficult question, and it is often easy to get into an 'it must be perfect' mindset. A sketch of the area is a good enough start. You only need the detail when two forces clash - adding every tree to a map lands up with most of the work being irrelevant. 

A general map of the area is a good start - you can photocopy a map from a book of the campaign for personal use. A modern map helps with roads and built-up areas. No map is really going to give you the battlefield information, so you will just have to make it up, I think; walking a battlefield gives a very different view than examining a map of it. 

I hope that helps. The best way of starting a campaign is to get on with it, and invent stuff as you go along, when needed.

I'm sure I've seen a film about how Greg Wagman goes about making maps for Little Wars TV... might be worth a look.  https://youtu.be/7ZJxv0nI0Yw 

I like the 'invent stuff as you go along', its what I usually do ;-) Perhaps you are right using simple maps  and then inventing battlefields as they come.

Greg Wagmans map-making film I know - it looks so easy, when he is doing it... It is perhaps easier to do it from scratch then modifying existing maps. Or maybe using the original map as a layer in a graphics/painting program? I should try that.

Thnaks for your help!

One idea for the 1809 campaign might be to get a copy of this PC game (it is often on sale) which has a hexmap for the entire 1809 campaign from Ulm to Znaim.

Thanks for the tip, there are indeed a lot of useful maps in computer games.

You can get topographical maps for 1807 Germany, that I've used before... check this site https://mal4955.blogspot.com/p/mals-small-world-napoleonic-atlas.html

With some digging I found all the maps to download from another site as well.

Oh thanks, that looks really good!