
                       General Introduction

Welcome to Starmap, a roleplaying game aid which can help you
design and map your own science-fiction RPG campaign setting. If
you like this program, feel free to redistribute it however you
wish, so long as you don't charge anything for it.

The basic idea behind the program is that you have quadrants of
space measuring ten lightyears to a side (1000 cubic light years in
volume). Within these quadrants exist starsystems that you can
create, attaching whatever campaign notes you happen to write in
the course of your rpg-session preparation. You can also add lines
connecting the various starsystems. These can represent trade
routes, hyperspace conduits, or whatever you deem appropriate to
your campaign.

In addition to the program, a sample galaxy has been included,
along with various discussions regarding the creation of a science
fiction rpg setting.

I developed this program for two reasons. First, there's been a lot
of call among SF-RPGers for 3d-starmapping software. Other freeware
programmers have taken stabs at producing a solution for this
problem, so I figured I may as well add my own to the pile. The
second reason is that alot of people are working on their own sf-
rpg settings, but very few are working as a group on a common
setting. I wanted to give people a way to contribute to a
shared-setting via a program which would allow separate maps to
join seemlessly together. If you want to take part in such a
project, let me know. I'm interested in organizing the creation of
an sf-rpg complete with a unique setting.

No doubt you will have many questions about Starmap which aren't
addressed here, so please feel free to contact me...

             jimv@empirenet.com - JimVassila@aol.com
                http://members.aol.com/JimVassila   

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