Maps and charts are ways of depicting the layout of an area onto a sheet of paper (or other surface) to help prevent people from getting lost.
They also manifest in fiction in a variety of ways and serve a variety of purposes:
Maps in general:
- Connect the Deaths: Put a pin in every disaster, and find who caused it all.
- Fantasy Counterpart Map: It vaguely resembles Earth, but the landmasses have been reshaped.
- Fantasy World Map: No Fantasy setting is truly complete without this handy visual aid.
- Fool's Map: A map that leads you on a Wild Goose Chase.
- Here There Be Dragons: "Filler" as it applies to otherwise blank and/or unknown areas of maps.
- Law of Cartographical Elegance: All relevant landmasses will conveniently fit into a rectangular containing area.
- Left-Justified Fantasy Map: Why is the ocean always on the left?
- Magic Map: A map that does more than just show roads and towns. People, objects, or supernatural things may also be shown.
- Map All Along: A previously misunderstood object is suddenly recognized as a map.
- Map Stabbing: Sharp objects are forcefully driven into maps.
- Space-Filling Empire: Maps are drawn with a small number of superstates for easier political relations.
- Spreading Disaster Map Graphic: Maps provide a vivid illustration of the scope of a looming or ongoing disaster.
- Travel Montage: Travel between multiple locations, with maps used during the cuts to represent distances traveled.
- Treasure Map: X marks the spot after you take fifty paces east of that palm tree between the rocks!
- World Tour: Characters travel to multiple destinations, with maps used to identify the location.
- "X" Marks the Spot: This is where you'll find the buried gold!
Maps in Video Games:
- Alternate World Map: Video games, especially RPGs, may utilize more than one world map for assorted reasons.
- Cartography Sidequest: The game draws and fills in level maps as you actually explore them.
- Crow's Nest Cartography: Find a high point and use it to fill in a swath of the map.
- Level-Map Display: Shows your position inside a video game level, and may update in real-time.
- Overworld Not to Scalenote : An interactive "map" or small-scale view of the world that the player can freely travel upon between distinct areas.
- Patchwork Map: Biomes may not match latitude and climate, but are simply placed here and there like provinces.
- Point-and-Click Map: Map screen that lets you point and click to instantly travel between discrete levels/areas, Warp Whistle style.
- "Risk"-Style Map: Used in a Strategy Game setting to indicate who controls which territories.
