Kal-els 140x140 Earth Resources bic & bix

Kal-els 140x140 Earth Resources v1.0 Readme.

This map is my atttempt at creating an accurate world map of 140x140 proportions. I am hoping that this size map will alleviate the long waits that can be seen on some of the larger maps.

Unlike other maps that used either a Miller’s Projection or even Mercator’s which tend to distort the shapes of the land masses the further towards the poles the land mass is, I used separate projections for each of the continents and then combined each of those projections into one single image. This process helps to alleviate the distortion of land mass shape and ensure that the outlines of the continents remaines as true to life as possible within the limitations of converting a round shape onto a flat surface. The process of combining the multiple projections has a draw back in that is distorts some distances across bodies of water and the areas where the continents meet are also often times distorted. The land to water ratio on this map is not earth accurate. The map is 65% water. In order to preserve the detail level I reduced the size of both the Atlantic and the Pacific. It is however impossible to cross either ocean with a Galley without The Great Lighthouse.

In addition I took some liberties with the comparitive size of the continents. This was done mainly for gameplay purposes. As a result Europe and North America are larger than they are in Real Life. Likewise the Island nations of the United Kingdom and Japan are both larger than one would expect on a completely accurate map. Because of these changes other areas were reduced in size.

To make room for an enlarged Europe which has been stretched just a bit eastward into Asia in order to give those civs some more room and to cut down the Asian Advantage. Africa was also shrunken to accomodate Europe and to reduce the advantage that civs starting on this continent have over other civs due to the vast open expanses.

South America was also reduced in size for mainly the same reasons that Asia and Africa were.

I tried to place the resources as accuraely as possible. For gameplay purposes I limited myself in the total number of Strategic and Luxury resources on this map. Using 12 players as base reference, I then calculated the number of strat resources that should appear based on the standard appearance ratios given in an unmodded Civ3mod.bic file. I was not completely true to these numbers but I did use them as a point of reference. To determine the number of Luxury resources I looked at several randomly generated maps and discovered that the random resource placement tends place a number of Luxury resources totallying 75% of the number of number of civs available, i.e. if 12 civs are playing the total numberof luxury resources will average nine of each luxury resource. The formula for determining the average number of luxury resources to place is L*X/C where L equals the number of Luxury resources (eight in a standard game), X equals 3/4 the number of Civs, and C equals the number of Civs.

A few quick notes:
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The Faroe Islands are a bit further over to the East than in real life to prevent an easy crossing to North America.

There are mountains in Greenland to prevent mass colonization of that region. I recommend that you set tundra as unsettlable.

Also plains and grassland were interchanged where necessary to create a more accurate coastline.

Some areas of desert were made into plains if a river ran through it in order to pevent the mass food production of the floodplain syndrome.

I hope you enjoy playing on it as much as I enjoyed designing it. If you have any suggestions you can contact me at dickjensen@hotmail.com or through civfanatics.com. This map was created by me, Kal-El, December 2002.


For a Closer look Click Here

BiQ version
Kal-el's 140x140 Earth with Resources v1.0Q

Here is a Bic Version with 16 Civ Starting locations and Resources.

Here is a Bix Version with 24 Civ Starting locations and Resources.

I'll try a game with it, and I'll do an "adapted rules" version if I find it unbalanced

-Ah, the Celts should start from Marseille, not for Austria. But I suppose you did it for gameplay
-Peking is a little north
-IMPORTANT: Turks should start from the tile that connects to the black sea. Otherwise no turkish ships will ever go in and out from the black to the mediterranean

I start the Celts in Pyrene. I didn't change the name because I didn't want to override any changes a player may have made to the default rules. "The Celts originally inhabited an area in southern Germany and Bohemia. By the end of the 5th century BC they had expanded into the Iberian peninsula; in 390 BC they sacked Rome. In the east they went as far as Anatolia. In the west they migrated to Britain in the 5th century BC and Ireland in the 3rd century BC." http://www.celticcrossroads.com/index1.htm

"The oldest known reports of the Celts are attributed to the Greek historian Herodotus (about 484 to around 430 BC), who mentions a town called Pyrene in Celtic territory on the upper reaches of the Danube. However, Herodotus himself had never actually set foot in that area, and probably based his report on an even older source: Hecataeus of Miletus, who wrote in the middle of the 6th century BC. The written sources go no further back than this, however." http://www.dhm.de/museen/heuneburg/en/einf_frame.html

-The Chinese are starting in Xianyang (near modern Xi'an - though I placed it a bit south east of where Xi'an might more accurately be placed). Xianyang was the Capital of China under the Ch'in Dynasty. The Ch'in dynasty ruled from 221 B.C. to 206 B.C. Not the longest Dynasty by any strethc of the imagination but, the word China is derived from Ch'in, the first dynasty to unify the country by conquering the warring feudal states of the late Chou period. Whereas Beijing wasn't the capital of China until 1421.

-The starting tile for the Ottomans does connect the Black Sea and Aegean. See the image below. The pink arrows point to each water tile that is connected to the starting location.

Entremont is Celts' starting point, Beijing is Chinese's
And Entremont is modern Marseille, and Beijing is not Xi'an

I understand you base on historical facts, but if you want to do that then you should change city names

I didn't want to change the city names because that would over ride any other modifications that a player may have made to the default rules. I wasn't going to do that to people just for 3 cities.

Hey thank Kal-el for making this map. Even 180x180 maps are a chore for my old computer (especially in the later stages). 140x140 seems to be the best of all worlds (playability and scope) for myself and probably most other civ players.

Great work.

I had 2 games on this map, both very enjoyable. Thank you for the map.

you are welcome. I am glad people are enjoying the map.

Considering the size of the map you've done a great job in terms of accuracy and detail...

Another aspect that is important to note. With PTW multiplayer you can only have 8 players, so the larger world maps would be rather empty, whilst this map would be much better suited for such numbers.





P.S I think you should advertise it abit more, it has only been downloaded some 26 times so far.

Glad you like it. I actually like it better than my larger maps.

Where should I advertise it?

Just post around a little at civfanatics and apolyton and then add a link to it as a P.S

I hope you'll try next time using dimensions that will better match those of the shape of the earth....


Thus where the east/west axis is longer that the north/south axis. I'd certainly be interested in such a map, at present the 140X140 is stretched in the North/South axis and compressed East/West as well you know

I have been contemplating doing another round of maps based on the Winkel-Tripel Projection. Of course those maps would maintian proportionalities between continents and would lead to loss of detail in many areas, most notably Europe. So, given that, I am reluctant to design them.

It's good as it is

Originally posted by Rhye
It's good as it is

Click to expand...

This from the man who introduced me to Winkel-Tripel.

Good work as useual, the best CTP map for PTW for humans ...
Thank you

I join in the congratulations for your super map.

I've imported it to my own mod.

I hope you don't mind.

Thank You once more for your work!

(5 STARS)

I don't mind at all. Thats why I posted it here.