Map Discussion

Now for the other major question I need from each team: what kind of map do you want? I'm going to provide some general maps scripts, which will serve as a basis for the customized map that will follow. What I want your team to do is let me know what kind of map you'd like to see for this game. Here are five general options to think about:

Wheel: One of the better Multiplayer maps for this sort of game, and a very "fair" map, with equal territory for all civs and access to each team. May be too unnatural for some teams' tastes. Also on the small side.



Donut: A fun script added in the expansion. All the teams start on the outside edge of the donut, with a large region of peaks in the middle. The peaks can also be replaced by water, or standard terrain, if desired. Lots of early contact on this map.



Islands: A map that features lots of water and naval combat. Each team has their own starting island to themselves, which may or may not be what you want. The islands by default are separated by ocean, but they can be bridged by turning on the "tiny islands" setting.

No Tiny Islands


Various Tiny Islands


Archipelago/Snaky Continents: One of my personal favorites, due to the crazy and unpredictable land forms it spits out. Navies will still be emphasized heavily on this script. Here are three different looks, with different settings:







Global Highlands: A more interesting take on Pangaea, IMO. The peaks make for all sorts of wacky geographical formations, and interesting decisions on where to settle. Lots of customization options in the settings too. The latter two pictures explore some of the peak options.







Now what I would like from each team is to discuss and agree on a ranking of your three top preferences. This doesn't mean that you'll necessarily get the script that you picked first, but I will take into account what kind of map each team wanted. For example, if your team was dead-set on an Islands map, I'll lean more towards the naval ones in the overall decision. You can also simply say, "we trust the map maker, come up with a mystery game that looks awesome" as I know a couple of teams have suggested. If that's the general team feeling, you can skip this discussion entirely.

Once again, I'm asking each team to come to a decision on their top three map preferences by Wednesday, November 19th of next week. At that point, I'll see what each team decided and do my best to come up with something agreeable to everyone (although that may be impossible...) Thanks for your input, and I'm looking forward to hearing from you!

 

My personal opinion is that knowing even a general pattern of the map can take quite a lot of fun and drama out of the discovery phase of the game. In the civ3 game, we had quite a good time trying to understand the world's odd geography (turn out it was a toroidal world, with 5 roughly equal continents and several smaller islands. There was also treasure waiting to be found in the Southern Sea!)

So I'm sticking with my opinion posted in the UN thread:
1. tactically and strategically challenging terrain, whether that be water barriers or mountain barriers, or a combination thereof.
2. Yes to roughly equal starts, but not a formally balanced map.
3. Contact between all teams should be possible without Optics
4. Mundus planus non est.

 

I wholeheartedly agree with Peter; that is, I don't think we should know what the map is like, even its general composition. We should leave it at standard / temperate / low seas and have the random generator pop one out for us.

But my favorite of all those maps is the first "archipelago" map. I like the option of establishing colonies on vanilla islands.

 

i do like playing on islands with various tiny islandsa fishing boat can usually find everything, but it probably would be best to have absolutly no idea and just let it be random

 

So far it seems like our team is tending towards a modification of my earlier proposal:

1. tactically and strategically challenging terrain, preferring water barriers to mountain barriers, or a combination thereof.
2. Yes to roughly equal starts, but not a formally balanced map.
3. Contact between all teams should be possible without Optics
4. Mundus planus non est.

 

What's #4? Sorry, my Latin isn't really good. Though "mundus" probably means world. And then if planus means flat, then perhaps "no flat world"?

 

Yup. The earth is not flat.

I only put that in there more for Sullla's enjoyment, since I assume he knows Latin.

 

Ironically, I'm reading a book titled "The Earth is Flat". Its by Thomas Friedman and is pretty convincing!

 

I think it would be fun if we could get early contact with some teams, like two continents. Or small islands which are close enough for a triteme to give an swing to the navel part of the game.

 

I'm sure there will be early contact with at least 2 teams. Sullla has mentioned that in one of the two Map threads in the UN.

 

I would like to remind your team that the deadline for the map discussion is coming up in a few days, and it would be nice to see a clearer voice from Team 5 on this issue. I'm hearing general support for a custom map within certain parameters - if you want to provide any more feedback, now's your chance! Otherwise, I will mark down Team 5 in the "interesting mystery map" category. Just want to make sure that's OK with your team.

 

My wish
contacts to all other teams should be possible without astro.

 

"interesting mystery map" - that is my category

 

I've started a post that Sullla can refer to when checking our formal responses to his requests. This doesn't mean discussion is complete; I will edit our official position as needed.