Possible Return of Pangea Maps

[MACKA0ili]

With the newest patch making treasure resources able to be spawned on all landmasses and hinting at "distant land" starts for future updates, the return of the pangea map type seems likely.

Originally, pangea maps conflicted with the home vs distant lands dynamic in the exploration age. But, now that its subjective for each player based on where they spawned, a pangea map could have both distant and homelands on a single landmass. The question is how they would handle the separation between the two, if they should at all.

 

[Krikkit1]

I voted hard separation, but it doesn't require Mountain+Ice... just Mountain and Ocean (if a tile adjacent to land could be ocean then you can block just fine)

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Hard separation is not required.

The Silk Roads wound across central Asia for centuries providing a trickle of luxury goods but without making any major change to the economies of either the West (specifically, Rome and to a lesser degree, Persia) and the East (China). That as because an overland route could only transport relatively minor amounts of goods - a pack load for most animals was about 50 - 100 kg, so only high value, small volume goods could be transported at all.

Give Land trade routes similar restrictions in the game, and a 'soft' separation across deserts/mountains/passes/ et al could allow restricted Trade Routes by land while not allowing the lucrative cash flow of Treasure Fleets, which would require Exploration Age ships.

For example, a real in-game Silk Road across land might allow only the transport of any Resources you do not have at your end of the Trade Route. IF you have no Camels, then 'Camel' from the other end wold be a legitimate Silk Road good. Have any Camel anywhere on your 'side' of the continent/pangaea mass, and that Resource is not eligible to trade. Basically, this represents the fact that it has to be really, really exclusive to be worth transporting all that distance overland.

That would mean. effectively, mostly only Treasure Resources would be eligible, unless your side of the continent/pangaea is all one biome - like no Tropical areas to provide Elephant/Ivory or no Desert to provide Camels. That would also allow the sudden Upgrade in Exploration, when new ships allow the deep sea long-distance trade routes that historically could transport much greater tonnages of goods (even an average Carrack, for example, could haul 200 - 500 tons, the equivalent of several thousand camel pack-loads, and they wouldn't have to be divided up into 100 kg parcels)

 

[Krikkit1]

Hard separation is not required.

The Silk Roads wound across central Asia for centuries providing a trickle of luxury goods but without making any major change to the economies of either the West (specifically, Rome and to a lesser degree, Persia) and the East (China). That as because an overland route could only transport relatively minor amounts of goods - a pack load for most animals was about 50 - 100 kg, so only high value, small volume goods could be transported at all.

Give Land trade routes similar restrictions in the game, and a 'soft' separation across deserts/mountains/passes/ et al could allow restricted Trade Routes by land while not allowing the lucrative cash flow of Treasure Fleets, which would require Exploration Age ships.

For example, a real in-game Silk Road across land might allow only the transport of any Resources you do not have at your end of the Trade Route. IF you have no Camels, then 'Camel' from the other end wold be a legitimate Silk Road good. Have any Camel anywhere on your 'side' of the continent/pangaea mass, and that Resource is not eligible to trade. Basically, this represents the fact that it has to be really, really exclusive to be worth transporting all that distance overland.

That would mean. effectively, mostly only Treasure Resources would be eligible, unless your side of the continent/pangaea is all one biome - like no Tropical areas to provide Elephant/Ivory or no Desert to provide Camels. That would also allow the sudden Upgrade in Exploration, when new ships allow the deep sea long-distance trade routes that historically could transport much greater tonnages of goods (even an average Carrack, for example, could haul 200 - 500 tons, the equivalent of several thousand camel pack-loads, and they wouldn't have to be divided up into 100 kg parcels)

True... but that requires a big change in game mechanics... add "Limited trade routes" etc. Land Terrain that you can cross for limited trade routes but not settle in/or conquer at that distance/ etc.

simply adding a mountain+ice+ocean barrier should be enough, (and if there is ocean as part of that barrier, then it opens up on exploration.)

 

[Ryansinbela]

How would distant land starts work

 

[UWHabs]

I wouldn't hate if they made some movement changes, maybe make desert tiles act like rough seas in the ancient era? Although you'd still have some coast connecting the lands even in that case, unless if you also add some unpassable coast tiles (like ice, maybe add like a Kelp Forest or Barrier Reef or something).

I haven't played yet on the new patch, but I feel like you still should need a hard barrier for something to count as "distant lands" still. So yeah, if you wanted a Pangaea map, I feel you'd need a similar mechanism to split home and distant lands.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

True... but that requires a big change in game mechanics... add "Limited trade routes" etc. Land Terrain that you can cross for limited trade routes but not settle in/or conquer at that distance/ etc.

simply adding a mountain+ice+ocean barrier should be enough, (and if there is ocean as part of that barrier, then it opens up on exploration.)

Playing Pangaea maps in Civ VI, I remember many, many times finding that a large mountain range with a limited number (3 - 5) of 1-tiles wide passes through it effectively 'compartmentalized' the continent.

Something like that, in which the 'pass' tile is given some of the attributes of a Deep Sea tile, might accomplish want we want in a Pangaea Distant Lands map.

For example, the Pass might be traversable by Scouts, but not by military Units, Commanders, Settlers/Colonists, Merchants or Trade Routes until Exploration: you might know roughly what's on the other side of the continent and even be able to interact with the Civs there diplomatically (as, for example, Rome and China did by the 2nd century CE), but in Antiquity at least, you couldn't do much of anything else.

This would require a re-definition of a single tile type and probably a redefining of attributes/characteristics for the Scout units, which should be much easier than adding an entirely new 'type' of Trade Route.

 

[MACKA0ili]

How would distant land starts work

You would just start in what would normally be considered distant lands for a regular game.