I mentioned this in the download thread, but here it is again - before doing the settler and city maps is the best chance for any map edits. I'm not talking about massive map changes, just small, doable things that won't change the rest of the map. Mountains-to-hills, that kind of thing.

p.s. Free maps! http://www.unc.edu/awmc/mapsforstudents.html

Here's one I came across while trying to do Roman city names - Italy is too scrunched in the center. Adding another row of tiles should stretch it enough to help it look better and give the Romans and Etruscans more room.

This will push Sicily significantly closer to the African coast, but that looks like it could use some improvement anyway.

Greece has, I think, an extra spot of land on the western edge of the north coast of the Gulf of Corinth.

I'd also like to expand the peninsula that Thessaloniki should be on a square to the west, and get rid of the jutting peninsula on the east coast of northern Greece.

I'd like to do something with Rhodes, but I'm not sure there's room.

You might consider this futile, but I have something against the map, especially in the Mediterranean area: the terrain there is made solely of plains, and the color plains have do not give a very nice look to the map. It seems as if there was no vegetation at all, except in the cases there's forest. To me, plains look like deserts, only "softer", while many places around the sea were/are very fertile and green. I suggest adding a bit more grasslands and forests to give it a better feeling. But perhaps that's just me ;)

I don't disagree with that, but that's one of the things that can be edited without messing up city and settler maps, happily. Since this doesn't (yet) use RFC graphics, it might look better when those things get edited.

Ugh. The more I look at this, the more I can think of that I want to change, but that know would be massive amounts of work to change. Asia Minor could use two squares of stretching, I think.

You said yourself, "I'm not talking about massive map changes, just small, doable things that won't change the rest of the map. Mountains-to-hills, that kind of thing." Stretching areas here and there is against that and against Rhye's idea to make the map small enough for the sake of gameplay. You can change some things if you feel it's really necessary, but beware, you might not come out of this alive...

The one thing I'd like to change is Corsica: it's way too big right now, as large as Sardinia while it should be significantly smaller. Even RFC:Europe has a smaller Corsica! I'd remove the top two squares, I think.

I don't disagree with that, but that's one of the things that can be edited without messing up city and settler maps, happily. Since this doesn't (yet) use RFC graphics, it might look better when those things get edited.

Good. I just wanted to mention it, it's been bugging me for a while.

I don't think enlarging Italy would do that much damage. Maybe half an extra city. I doubt it'll halt Roman expansion.

Asia Minor, on the other hand...yeah. Probably should happen, probably could happen and only take up some of Persia's gargantuan amount of space, but that's a lot to do.

I'm asking Rhye what's possible to change and what isn't.

Comments/suggestions in no particular order:


British Isles need some hills, especially the Tundra up in Scotland
There should be at least one mountain tile representing Mt Sinai on the Sinai Peninsula
Suggest adding a Mountain island to represent Thera, somewhere to the N of Crete
Suggest adding a small river (one or two edges long only) at Athens location for fresh water
Gems could be added to Scandinavia to represent Amber from this region
Some weird coastal effects are currently happening on the NW corner of Iberia, looks a bit like green waves to me
There is currently a Sheep on top of an oasis in the NE corner of the Red Sea, shouldn't this be one or the other? Suggest splitting to separate tiles
Suggest moving the Stone which is adjacent to the Persian Gulf (1E and 2S of Babylon) one tile further to the south, out of the BFC of Babylon which already has two Stones to work anyway.

I think Cilicia and Italy could be a little larger, as well as the Peloponnese.

If there is still a way to go from the waters near the Iberian peninsula to the waters south of the map (where Africa is supposed to be) I suggest changing a tile to a mountain or something to block access to these waters.

Here's a new map with a bunch of the edits suggested by y'all, and approved by Rhye.

The old and new screenshots show Italy and Greece's changes. I actually simmed a game where Carthage expanded into Sicily on its own, which was exciting, although the settler maps will do that anyway in the next version.

I'll try to fiddle with the Excel files with more accurate maps tomorrow. I'm still working on the Romans, but nobody else should be significantly affected by the changes.


I may see if I can stretch Asia Minor out tomorrow as well, but I suspect that'll be a huge amount of work.

I know this doesn't fit here but there's no other proper thread.

This is the last map I had for the dead project previous to this one:
http://www.mediafire.com/?jhzwzgyhm33

Not for the map itself, but for the resources and terrain types I used; some of them can be put here in the future, I spent some time doing it and think it could be useful.