Game Map expands?

[Arent11]

While reading about the age transition, I came across a few sentences that mentioned that the "game map expands" upon transition.

If I understand that correctly, we don't anymore have a fixed world map. Instead, we can only explore a limited part of the map, And with each additional age more tiles are being added?

That's... weird. Why would you expand the map upon age transition?

In the past, this was simply done through technology - to cross the sea, you needed ships, to cross oceans, you needed advanced ships.

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

I quite like the idea as a gameplay mechanic (time & technology literally expanding your empire's horizons) but I've no idea how they'll implement it without it feeling / looking a little weird. Looking forward to finding out more.

 

[Professor Phobo]

We don't know exactly how it will work yet. It could be that the game is scripted to ensure a large portion of the map is behind Ocean tiles, but that part of the map is still "there" throughout the course of the game and stuff was happening off-screen the whole time. It could be it reloads the map but it's bigger now and it's spawned in the AI civs and independent peoples on the other continent.

As for why it might work that way, could just be they do a map reload on an age transition anyway for other reasons, and there's no sense in using CPU time modelling the actions of AI the player can't interact with anyway. Or take the risk that one of the other continent guys does a runaway and the Age of Exploration is the Age of when we found out the Hyper-Aztecs conquered half the planet while we were farting around with the Sea Peoples.

 

[Arent11]

I quite like the idea as a gameplay mechanic (time & technology literally expanding your empire's horizons) but I've no idea how they'll implement it without it feeling / looking a little weird. Looking forward to finding out more.

Well, for a board game/settlers of Catan that would definitely be an interesting mechanic - adding unknown tiles that are turned over once you discover them.

But in a PC game it's just not necessary. You can simulate an entire world.

I guess it is done to keep the "exploration" aspect of the game until the later parts. But it feels a bit forced - once I have ships, why can't I sail around the entire world/Magellan?

 

[Arent11]

We don't know exactly how it will work yet. It could be that the game is scripted to ensure a large portion of the map is behind Ocean tiles, but that part of the map is still "there" throughout the course of the game and stuff was happening off-screen the whole time. It could be it reloads the map but it's bigger now and it's spawned in the AI civs and independent peoples on the other continent.

Well, but in Age of Exploration you should have ships that can traverse oceans if I read it correctly. If so, I should be able to explore the entire world. Maybe apart from arctic regions.

 

[Big J Money]

Maybe they'll have 3 ocean depths. In the beginning of the Exploration age will be the first ships that can sail to a nearby continent or continents. And in the beginning of the third age will be the first deep sea vessels that can explore an even further continent?

 

[Arent11]

Maybe they'll have 3 ocean depths. In the beginning of the Exploration age will be the first ships that can sail to a nearby continent or continents. And in the beginning of the third age will be the first deep sea vessels that can explore an even further continent?

I suspect the game map really expands. This is just speculation, though.

 

[Big J Money]

Oh I do think it will expand, yes. I just mean that the map borders will be a depth of ocean that was once unpassable. This would of course limit the game to only one map type, so I hope it's not the route they are taking. Even if they did oceans and mountains, that would still limit map design choices.

 

[Atlas627]

Well since the Ages literally frame the techs you can have, the Ages are just as appropriate for expanding the map. In Antiquity, you can't sail over the oceans, so there's no need for a New World yet. In Exploration, part of the point will be to go across oceans and encourage expansion into the New World, so time to enable it. Then in Modern, technology will enable expansion into the hinterland, much like how communication and medical advances allowed penetration into the American and African interiors. So I suspect they'll make the New World bigger.

 

[TheSpaceCowboy]

As someone who almost exclusively played on Terra maps, this mechanic just enshrines my preferred playstyle as the new standard way for everyone to play

 

[TheGrayFox]

Well since the Ages literally frame the techs you can have, the Ages are just as appropriate for expanding the map. In Antiquity, you can't sail over the oceans, so there's no need for a New World yet. In Exploration, part of the point will be to go across oceans and encourage expansion into the New World, so time to enable it. Then in Modern, technology will enable expansion into the hinterland, much like how communication and medical advances allowed penetration into the American and African interiors. So I suspect they'll make the New World bigger.

oh great every map is now a terra map... who would've guessed the majority of players who typically play continents or pangea secretly wanted to play terra map.....

I also really love exploring the map being locked behind artifically rubberbanded era/round transtitions that every player experiences at exactly the same time....

 

[Professor Phobo]

Not necessarily. It could be a second cluster of islands in an archipelago map. The map expansion could vary by map type, too - there could be variations where it's mountain ranges that block off access, for Pangaea type gameplay.

 

[TheGrayFox]

Not necessarily. It could be a second cluster of islands in an archipelago map. The map expansion could vary by map type, too - there could be variations where it's mountain ranges that block off access, for Pangaea type gameplay.

This ain't it chief

 

[Professor Phobo]

This ain't it chief

We don't now how the map expansion will work! How do you know? Are you Firaxis? Is this a complex double bluff?

Ed Beach in disguise.

 

[moysturfurmer]

The impression I got was that the map only expands in the Exploration era. A second expansion in Modern doesn’t really make a lot of sense to me. It’s not as if it took until the invention of the photograph for us to have mapped out the world.

But one thing I find curious, and telling, is the multiplayer player limit across each age. Consider the following: 5 players in Antiquity, 5 in Exploration, 8 in Modern. I feel like there’s a reason it stays the same in the first two eras. My theory is, once the map expands it reveals a new continent. However, this continent is not made up of Exploration Era civs. The new world will be populated by Antiquity civs and independent nation. The colonization of this new world would play into one of the victory conditions of this Era. The reason the player limit stays the same from antiquity is because these civs are not intended to be viable for this era. Upon entering the modern age, these civs and independent nations also become modern, and viable for human players to play, so the max player count for this age becomes 8

 

[Krikkit1]

The way I could see it working

1. All Default maps: subtypes of Terra (guaranteed ocean separation)
“New World” options
-Independent people only
-New AI players
-Initial players may be divided up among several mutually inaccessible “Worlds”…at least 2 / “World”

However specialized maps options may have no ocean borders

2. In Era 1 regardless of the map, units will take damage/be unable to heal/get lost in the foreign lands/wilderness if they are too far from the capital?and settlements can’t be controlled past a certain distance from the capital.

So a TSL map Rome will never explore China or South Africa with their scouts, armies or settlers. Their scouts might contact chinese scouts for diplomatic purposes. so trade routes could be sent,

…But that way even a True Pangea map would “expand”going to the next age as those restrictions are lifted and you can start trading maps, etc.


A modern age map could expand the map into Polar areas, or “expand it” by having vast numbers of new resources to find.

 

[Atlas627]

We don't now how the map expansion will work! How do you know? Are you Firaxis? Is this a complex double bluff?

Ed Beach in disguise.

"This ain't it, chief" is a phrase that means "this isn't what I'm looking for" or "not good enough".

That being said, clearly the game just isn't for them, and it'd be better for everyone's mental health if they stopped consuming content about Civ7.