Which map types do you play and why?

small because of my laptop (although it feels bigger than bts small)

and archipeligo - i love naval games.

I miss planet_generator and 'islands' setting though where the all teams got a seperate island with late contact at optics..

kaltorak said:

When you say it is like terra, does it also create a new continent where no civ starts? I'd like to try the script, I heard good things about it. But if it has a "new continent", it's something I'd only play from time to time.

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One large continent, then it varies, often there will be a smaller second continent then scattered large and small islands, but sometimes that second continent is much smaller and there are even more islands. I guess the best description from that point of view would be like a pangea map next to a variable continents to archipelago map with low sea level if that makes sense. There's an option to have all civs start in the old world or just scatter them about everywhere.

I usually scatter people everywhere, as even with 22 civs there will still be unexplored fertile land come astronomy, but not so much that it diminishes its value.

I think pangeas early game is harder than islands or continents. But I agree late game is easier, at least if you go Domination. But I just don't like spending so much time moving all my untis from continent to continent.
I also enjoy earlier eras more than modern ones, so it's ok for me if the start is harder than ending the game.

The QC said:

Recently I've been playing Standard Size Small Continents with the water level set to Low and 2 extra AIs added to compensate for the increased map space.

The resulting maps are very interesting, with interestingly shaped continents that have some choke-points and inner seas, some low depth connections between the various continents, a good amount of actually useable islands and no space wasted by vast empty seas. It's my new favorite map type.

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That sounds interesting. I'll give that a try since it sounds like what I've been looking for. Thank you for sharing your idea.

Large Shuffle with random starting civilization, 13 AI and 12 city states. I like surprises.

Surprised no one has mentioned continents plus. I feel like it's the most balanced map type. Plenty of small islands around the map, with 2-3 continents. Actually allows Spain and Indonesia to use their abilities, and it stops cheesy CS worker stealing at the beginning of the game.

Continents, it's the most balanced map-type IMO, also I like the idea of having to use my caravels to explore the "new world" and see what the other civs are doing.

I tend to play Fractal the most, even though sometimes it's a hit or a miss on what it generates.

Second is good ol Continents. It's relatively balanced but it can be boring at times.

Third is Terra. Lots of war and exploration in that map.

deity12 said:

Although had some great fun with the Shoshone on Great Plains.

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I had some pretty fun games with The Shoshone on Frontier maps. Starting out next to the frontier gives you plenty of chances to get Ruins, allows you to level up your Pathfinders/Bowfinders against barbs, and gives you lots of territory to expand into (and gobble up with their UA). But you need to protect those Trade Routes from all the barbs as well.

I used to play Random because I liked the uncertainty and surprise of what I'll get. But I've switched to Shuffle for even more randomness (unless I'm misreading the description). I wish there was a "random" map option that would throw all the maps into the mix (like Ring, Sandstorm, Highlands, etc.). Or at least an option where you could check boxes for which maps you want to include in the randomization.

Ikas said:

Surprised no one has mentioned continents plus. I feel like it's the most balanced map type. Plenty of small islands around the map, with 2-3 continents. Actually allows Spain and Indonesia to use their abilities, and it stops cheesy CS worker stealing at the beginning of the game.

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My last game was continents plus. I thought there would be settle-able island but found out that all the islands were inhabited solely by CSs. The opposite was also true, all the city states were also solely on islands.

I didn't like either of these things because A) settling islands is a fun thing I look forward to mid game and B) I didn't end up meeting the majority of the CSs until mid-late game due to them being on island and needing Astronomy (trireme couldn't reach them due to lack of open borders that I was unwilling to pay for or physically couldn't reach them due to deep water).

I also enjoy the tactical placement of my cities so that I am surrounded by CSs at key points, making invasion by neighbouring civs requiring passage through my allied city states. Continents plus (and I think Pangea plus) totally takes that away. If these 'plus' maps allows city states to be on the mainland, they would be the ideal map for me I think. I believe there are mods to these maps scripts that address these issues, however I am wary of using them as I assume that stops achievements from being acquirable? Not that I achievement hunt, but it is fun to accidentally stumble upon them and slowly acquire them.

I was playing a lot of huge continents but I'm liking standard size with standard settings a lot more now. I don't think the game is well designed for having tons of cities (AI gets too much happiness boost, to keep up requires a lot of religion or city states). I like continents plus a lot.

shaglio said:

I wish there was a "random" map option that would throw all the maps into the mix (like Ring, Sandstorm, Highlands, etc.)

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Wait, the "Random Map" option doesn't put things like Sandstorm and Arborea into the mix? I was always afraid of Random because I'd really really hate to play on something that favoured one terrain over the others.

Saintkat said:

If these 'plus' maps allows city states to be on the mainland, they would be the ideal map for me I think.

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I second this, Continents Plus makes some really nice layouts with the island chains, but the CS placement is such a let-down

Blitz Spearman said:

Wait, the "Random Map" option doesn't put things like Sandstorm and Arborea into the mix? I was always afraid of Random because I'd really really hate to play on something that favoured one terrain over the others.(

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Random only includes maps that are on "main" set-up screen (excluding Earth), without all the maps available in Advanced setup. So just Continents, Pangaea, Fractal and Archipelago.

Fractal.

Pretty sure I answered the same questions before...

I like the randomness.

Oh thanks, I might try random one of these days then.

Has anyone else played with PerfectWorld3? I tried it once in G&K and hated it. Part because the river placement was a bit too realistic, which made the game really unbalanced with almost every tile in the world providing 1 , and part because the terrain was also too much realistic, with hills surrounding mountains and large clusters of forest or jungle, and also small "beach" patches of land between mountains and coasts, where barbarians would always spawn. End result was that I simply could not meet another civ without building at least a couple of CBs and Swordsman, because the combination of barb camps at choke points and rough terrain everywhere made it completely impossible to scout the map.

I play almost solely True Start Location World or Europe maps. The map scripts in this game are horrible - and yes that includes PerfectWorld3 and Tectonic. Although perhaps I could fiddle some more with the settings. That low water level thing sounds like it's worth trying. But it's just a very different feeling for me to hold the Caucasus or Ceylon than Random Chokepoint #345 or Random NW Island #437. The randomness reminds me too much that I'm playing a game and not attaining real world domination.

paulcarri said:

I miss planet_generator and 'islands' setting though where the all teams got a seperate island with late contact at optics..

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You're looking for the 'Large Islands' script, it guarantees each Civ their own island. It's one of my favorite scripts as it tends to offer good balance(when I'm looking for that) otherwise I generally go for continents if I'm playing a standard game or archipelago for a huge game(the islands are pretty similar size to standard continents but with a lot more of them. I'll have to try it with low water level some time.)

Also I've recently discovered the Communitas map script. It fixes the one thing I hate about continents, the wide open seas. I haven't played it enough to give any solid conclusions but I like what I've seen so far. Gives you some good island chains and it can be gened as a Terra map as well if you're in the mood for some colonization.

Mostly fractal and continents and small continents, occasionally archipelago. I really like the "Small Continents Deluxe" mod, as well as the Plate Tectonics mod.