RiFE: Middle Earth map [playtesting]

[Deon]

Greetings! I've spent this night instead of writing some work to get an exam today... Well, , crap etc... Anyway I've spent it making this map from scratch. I used RiFe civs so this map is mod-compatible and doesn't require modding.

Currently I want a feedback about balance and possible tweaks to maintain it.


Current version is 108
Latest changes:
- Gondor, Lothlorien and Mithlond are now separate modular civs.
- The major change is that there're no teams now. Diplomacy is governed by huge relation boni/penalties, but any war is possible. Testing it.
- Gondor is separated in 2 civs: Gondor (main) and Dol Amroth (princedom), whith the former being a master of the latter. It should allow better management and change the fact that only Gondor started with that many cities.
-Gondor territory is changed. Lonhir is no longer a coastal city, as it should be. Also there's a road between Lonhir and Calembel.
- I've started to slowly integrate new unit art. Gondor Swordsman, Plalanx and Knight are now in the game.

Spoiler :

MAPSIZE: Standard (!)

Rules:
(A) 5 teams:
1) free people, Hobbits, Gondor, Rohan
2) Mithlond elves (Gray Havens) and Lothlorien elves (Rivendell and Lothlorien)
3) Dwarves
4) Haradrim, Easterlings, Mordor
5) Pirates of Umbar
Teams 1,2,3 are friendly; team 5 is at war with teams 1,2,3; teams (1,2,3) are at war with team 4.

(B) No settlers, no city razing, no city flipping from culture, no barbarians, no demons.

(C) No technology trading.

(D) Victory: Conquest.

I could forget something.

Screenies (without Landmark labels)

Spoiler :

 

[Deon]

Version 107 Changelog:

Spoiler :

- Moria and Isengard are barbarian.
- Clan (Orcs) settled in Carn Dum, on the north, in Angmar. Terrain is now suitable for a city there.
- Free People get Annuminas and Fornost.
- There's a Shelob lair.
- There's a "held" balrog in Moria. It's now possible to bypass Mines of Moria.
- Isengard now is a city, it has a black tower. Isengard is moved to the west, now it's possible to bypass it.
- Rohan has lost "Helm's deep" fortress, now Helm's Deep is a terrain landmark, and Rohan gained a Hornburg city in that valley.
- Rohan, Easterlings and Hobbits are now separate civs (modular), no unique art yet. Civs are not changed too much yet.
- New Unique Buildings for hobbits, new palace for hobbits, new resource for hobbits (pipe-weed).
- Other minor tweaks to the map.
- No worldspells.

Spoiler :

P.S. Here's a full map for version 102, I compiled it as I could. Current map is changed in many ways. It's here just to show general things.
Warning! Big image.

Spoiler :

 

[Deon]

OK I've found a few things which need to be fixed for a better picture:
1) There should be silk in Mirkwood, because currently there's a lot of spiders (>:E).
2) I forgot to name the fort of Mount Gundabad.
3) Easterlings seem to focus on Iron Hills only, they rarely send raiding parties to the west but lay sieges on the dwarven stronghold of Iron Hills, and even managed to capture it once (although dwarves took it back). Some terrain change, like a road to the west, maybe could help here.

Austrin are able to prepare expedition even with No Settlers option! It means that they can build new cities while others can't and have to use forts to grab new resources! I think I will leave it as it is, I will make them some traight like "disorganized" which makes the maintaince for number of cities higher and gives a penalty to production, and probably I will add a check on a total number of cities CONTROLLED, but it's later. For now they are rangers of the north who wander the wilderness and find new places for their settlements.

Also I will make teams of 2 later. It will slow down the research and I will add an option to declare on anyone. Thus elves would be able to fight dwarves etc.

I'd like to ask Valkirionn and other mods: is there a way to make AI to value forts more? Currently they live there 1-2 defenders, I want them to heavily protect forts, castles and especially citadels.

 

[xmen510]

I will try this out when i have a chance. Looks very interesting.

 

[Deon]

Thank you. I will post a version 1.04 soon, because I've made a few tweaks to the map (resource placement, forests, culture distribution) and I am going to make Isengard into a separate nation and to add a passage by Moria (to allow dangerous route near a hostile city) and add a "held" Balrod inside of Moria.

Also I've made Luchuirp into hobbits, they still don't have unique art and golems are there (although I already removed Barnaxus), but at least they have their unique buildings and racial promotion.

Please check the brainstorming thread and help me with your feedback .

P.S. If you know where to find more LOTR units, give me links . I've found Rohan art, but the file is not there. I am going to search for it.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=247893&highlight=rohan

 

[Sir DOC]

Check this: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=301994.
It had plenty of art for most of the usual LotR races.

 

[Deon]

But there's no download link .

Also, I think I'm settled with a time period. It will be an alternative Middle-Earth, presumably after the war of the ring.

Gondor and Rohan are allies, under Elessar and Eomer.
I will re-add Angmar, with an orcish capital Carn Dum (under Clan)
Moria will be barbarian and have a Balrog. Basically like a barbarian city with Acheron, an almost uncapturable city which will harrass nearby lands with barbarian units.
Isengard is a separate clan nation, under Saruman; also with 1 city in Dunland. I will move it to the west and turn Helm's Deep into a Rohirrim city (Hornburg).

I will make Austrin playable by AI only, they will remain Free People, and they will indicate not-yet-united kingdom of Arnor, kingdom of Dale and other places. I will give them Fornost and Annuminas to cover their real positions and to block Shire from a direct attack from Angmar.

 

[Deon]

New version is up, now with Hobbits, Easterlings and Rohan as unique civs. Mind you, there's a lot of work on them, but at least I've started to make modules

Current version is 107
Latest changes:
- Moria and Isengard are barbarian.
- Clan (Orcs) settled in Carn Dum, on the north, in Angmar. Terrain is now suitable for a city there.
- Free People get Annuminas and Fornost.
- There's a Shelob lair.
- There's a "held" balrog in Moria. It's now possible to bypass Mines of Moria.
- Isengard now is a city, it has a black tower. Isengard is moved to the west, now it's possible to bypass it.
- Rohan has lost "Helm's deep" fortress, now Helm's Deep is a terrain landmark, and Rohan gained a Hornburg city in that valley.
- Rohan, Easterlings and Hobbits are now separate civs (modular), no unique art yet. Civs are not changed too much yet.
- New Unique Buildings for hobbits, new palace for hobbits, new resource for hobbits (pipe-weed).
- Other minor tweaks to the map.
- No worldspells.

Spoiler :

 

[Swinkscalibur]

This is awesome. I am totally playing it when its done. Keep up the good work.

 

[Deon]

Thank you . Mind if you try the map? I need feedback to fix obvious faults and suggestions are always nice.

 

[Swinkscalibur]

Busy day today, but I will get to it, as soon as I can.

 

[Deon]

Thank you. I've got a personal message about how wrong is my map. I used a lot of maps, basically spent a few hours looking through them, and I tried to place locations to be in a close relation to the "real" LOTR places. I've made some "mistakes" on purpose to give more place for certain cities to grow and to allow proper logistics between different civilizations, and it was quite hard, considering the size of the map (just Standard). If you look on original map, it looks like there was no real trade between Hobbiton+Bree and Gondor+Rohan, because there were no real passages through the misty mountains. I don't want it on this map, I want at least one possible passage, and currently it's by Isengard, although you're harrassed by the city's troops.

Anyway, all comments are highly welcome.

 

[Deon]

Version 108 is up.

- Gondor, Lothlorien and Mithlond are now separate modular civs.
- The major change is that there're no teams now. Diplomacy is governed by huge relation boni/penalties, but any war is possible. Testing it.
- Gondor is separated in 2 civs: Gondor (main) and Dol Amroth (princedom), whith the former being a master of the latter. It should allow better management and change the fact that only Gondor started with that many cities.
-Gondor territory is changed. Lonhir is no longer a coastal city, as it should be. Also there's a road between Lonhir and Calembel.
- I've started to slowly integrate new unit art. Gondor Swordsman, Plalanx and Knight are now in the game.

Spoiler :

 

[Sir DOC]

But there's no download link .

You are right: he used to have the files hosted in his site. Since I still have the files in my HD, I've uploaded the assets folder in megaupload.
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=LUZYDWS9
You can give it a try.

 

[Deon]

Thank you very much! 126 Mb, it looks promising!

 

[LaughingTulkas]

Version 108 is causing a CTD whenever I try to open it, both from the scenario menu and directly from the world builder. I have FFH2 with the latest patch j installed, I simply copied the assets folder and the private maps folder into the FFH2 directory. Did I do something wrong?

 

[LaughingTulkas]

Oh, nm, I guess I need Rise from Erebus as well? The ffh community is so complicated. Any reason you didn't just use vanilla?

 

[Ekolite]

This looks great! Will definitely give it a try once it's closer to completion.

EDIT: And good call using a standard map as opposed to a large or even huge one. I hate it when I end up being unable to play great scenarios because the map size/number of civs is too much for my PC.

I would have prefered it being based on vanilla FFH though.

 

[Valkrionn]

Oh, nm, I guess I need Rise from Erebus as well? The ffh community is so complicated. Any reason you didn't just use vanilla?

Had he used vanilla several of the features he's using wouldn't exist. For one thing, forts putting out culture. He COULD have used Orbis rather than RifE for that one though.

 

[Deon]

There're other things from FF I want to implement later.
However I am not working on it todat like I was going to. I had a grudge with a wife and she promised a divorce . Well it was a drunk haze and all but still scary and I am not in a mood to mod right now, sorry . I will pick it up soon.