Alright, here‘s another WIP. I added some more of the major rivers so the space below the Ganges plains doesn‘t look so empty. I‘ve also found a map of mountain ranges: the slight markings all over the place denote the Aravalli Mountains, the Vindhya Mountains, the Satpura Mountains, the Deccan Plateau, the Chota Nagpur Plateau, and the Eastern Ghats, all of which I‘ll draw when the lettering‘s in place.
Would be fitting for a Buddhist book, I guess
It‘s also in the most crowded area of the map, I may have to shuffle things around a bit.
Regarding lettering: I‘ve decided to use all-capital serif letters, like the LOTR map (which at this point I‘m more or less copying), but I won‘t use Arno for copyright reasons, so the map can be freely distributed. Guess no one would be able to spot the difference with the handlettering, but just to be sure. Instead, there‘s an OpenFont licensed (i.e. free for personal and commercial use) version of the Garamond typeface, a French 16th century style which evolved from the humanist styles of the Italian Renaissance which Arno is based on.
Man, this is a bit more work than I had anticipated
Anyway, this is how far I‘ll get before the new year. Lettering‘s done save for two Mahajanapadas, most mountains and forests as well as the scale indicator and the India inlay are still missing, but you get the idea what it‘ll look like. Don‘t mind the eraser marks and guide lines, the final version will be digitally cleaned up.
Please go over the map to check for any more towns or regions you want put in, any spelling to be corrected, lettering to be redone or any style changes you may want. Now‘s the time! And don‘t be shy, I don‘t mind redoing stuff if it‘s not quite up to scratch.
I‘ll start doing the rest in 10 days or so.
We need to get the topography more accurate. The southern hills are not clumped together like that. In fact the opposite: those towns and regions are known because they are on the southern road that skirts the hills.
So you can see that from the main area around Rajagaha, the hills stretch south-west, so travellers would keep to their north. Then closer to the coast—around modern Surat or Mumbai, they would hook back east down to Andhra.
This map also makes it really clear why the population basis was in the Ganges plain!
Generally speaking, the forests would be associated with the hilly areas. So for the southern hills, and really the whole area outside of the Ganges plain, we could sprinkle some forests. This is especially the case for the Himalayas, whose approaches are always described in ecstatic terms as full of gorgeous forests. Less forest around the settled areas would then make sense, too.
See, I have this theory: if we really understood how hard anything was, we would never start.
If only you‘d told me before I started samsara‘ing! Getting out of this cesspit has turned out to be a Herculean task
Joking aside, that topography is priceless! Thanks for the detailed input, I appreciate it very much. Good thing most of the mountains aren‘t in yet, this will look so much better on that level of accuracy.
Have you decided about Bavari‘s hermitage yet? Please also consider that some more points of the Parayanavagga journey are still missing because I couldn‘t place them accurately.
Don’t mind me, I’m just dropping in for a sticky-beak. This thread has just been my daily entertainment.
I’m loving seeing how the map is developing. Great work!
Alright! Took a bit longer (had a little crying break because of culture war sickness, this forum can be a real challenge sometimes), but I‘m back to drawing. Update soon
Alright, update time.
I struggled with emulating the height map. If you have any ideas how to do it better, that would be great.
What about the placement of Bavari‘s hermitage? Too close to Patitthana, too far away?
Don’t mind me, I’m just dropping in for a sticky-beak. This thread has just been my daily entertainment. 
If you have any ideas how to do it better, that would be great.