Im here to sort of brag, but more productively throw an idea out there that I have already myself completed and has helped me speed up the process of map making exponentially.

The Idea is called a Map Making kit, once GOA is closer to being completely done i will be releasing its Map making kit as a Demo to help put into context this system. The idea is something that removes the grunt work from mapping, which is 99% of the work. Simply use what i call a precompiler, using a library to export map files i am able to run a "uncompiled" map in dreamseeker in my map making kit environment, then with one press of a button i can automate using code the process of trees growing, flowers blooming, random debree being scattered, and more importantly causing turfs to interact with each other to generate natural looking environments, if there is a gravel road surrounded by grass, the grass creeps on the edges, placing denser grass inside grass causes it to do a similar effect. Water forms its edges automatically and more impressively objects like fences can be made using one tile and automatically will figure out which pieces are side pieces and which ones are facing north by what makes sense. I have a video im going to upload to illustrate how GOA accomplishes this.

So for people who fancy themselves amazing mappers, you might have a hard time competing with your manual labor against my time reduction measures, even I who is strapped for time can make 9 maps in a half an hour that look beautiful and would take hundreds of hours normally.

Proof of Concept:
http://homepages.ucalgary.ca/~ddvankam/byond/mmk.html

Fun tidbit, if your keen you can find GOA's original project name before I changed it, It was never intended to be the games actual name, i believe it was Life of a Shinobi, a parody on one of my more favorite WC3 custom maps, Life of a Peasant :P