Will you switch to the Big-and-Small map?

[futurehermit]

I like to play using the map that is most common on these strategy forums. In warlords that was usually continents, with some pangaea mixed in I guess. Toward the end it seemed like people were leaning more towards fractal.

But now with BtS, I'm curious if people will be switching to the Big and Small map as the map they usually play on??? If so, I will switch to it as well when posting games here and stuff.

One big "pro" for the Big and Small map is that it is a map with large continents that most players start on and then there are a bunch of islands. This means that there is land beyond "two big blobs" to settle (better than continents), but doesn't completely lack for land/production/etc. (better than islands). The biggest "pro" for it I think is that it gives the opportunity for colonies to really factor in, in a way that I don't think they would/could on continents and pangaea maps. I think you would rarely see colonies on these maps, but on Big and Small you are pretty much guaranteed to get some colonies!

What will you do?

 

[Quornix]

All of the new base maps are interesting (and, actually, quite similar). Hemispheres works well as replacement for Continents or Custom Continents (2-6 major landmasses, but MUCH nicer, and with plenty of islands), and Big and Small and Medium and Small totally kick Archipelago's butt.

Fractal is still, I think, unique in that you may wind up with only a few landmasses, including possible Pangeas, or the 6/1 split. Mostly, someone made up a functional island chain generator, and they use it to excellent effect in the various versions.

I suspect that Hemispheres is going to wind up being the default map generator. Continents was too predictable (and generally ugly), which is why Fractal took off. Set Hemispheres to 2 landmasses and you have an interesting version of Continents.

 

[BARBEERIAN]

Big'n'Small and Medium'n'Small are both my favourite maps right now. I find they just lead to really well balanced games. If you start on a smaller island there's always plenty of good spots to islandhop and settle so you don't suffer in isolation as long.

I like how it involves a lot of naval action, and tends to provide a lot of cool spots for canal cities / coastal forts to make for some interesting naval possibilities. Perfect map for privateers too, I've had so much fun spamming out pairs of privateers to blockade friends and foes alike and listening to the piles of gold roll in each turn!

 

[Quornix]

Big'n'Small and Medium'n'Small are both my favourite maps right now. I find they just lead to really well balanced games. If you start on a smaller island there's always plenty of good spots to islandhop and settle so you don't suffer in isolation as long.

I like how it involves a lot of naval action, and tends to provide a lot of cool spots for canal cities / coastal forts to make for some interesting naval possibilities. Perfect map for privateers too, I've had so much fun spamming out pairs of privateers to blockade friends and foes alike and listening to the piles of gold roll in each turn!

Just stopped a game of Medium and Small. Played as Netherlands, and picked up the Colossus and Great Lighthouse. You can expand to your heart's content, as each new city pays for itself at pop 2. If you can get dikes before Astronomy, every coastal tile is 2/1/4. Pop a golden age, and that becomes 2/2/5.

I also got a random event that gave all my swordsmen CR I. I plunked it into Vassalage and was churning out CR3 Swords for a long time (I put off Civil Service, since I wanted to go exploring with Caravels, and since I couldn't run Bureaucracy). Some of the random events are close to broken.

 

[lilnev]

I've been playing the Tectonics custom script lately, and really liking it. Realistic mountain ranges and rainfall patterns, generally with a mix of large and smaller landmasses. Check it out.

peace,
lilnev

 

[sigmakan]

The new maps have too much land for my liking, even with high sea-level it feels like there is way too much space to expand. I'm bad at REXing and would prefer to have enemies fairly close to lay seige on.

I do think they are pretty well balanced, just TOO much land.

 

[uncarved block]

If I stop playing Big and Small maps, it will be because the AI doesn't seem to have any sense of balance when it comes to REXing. Even with Colonies, the AI is spreading too many (bad) cities too often, and driving their research into the ground. I guess this might be better strategy for the long term, especially since early warfare got a lot harder, but I get the sense that human players will still be able to exploit Corporations better than the AI, meaning that they'll never relinquish the tech lead even when all those AI cities finally come around. Then again, I haven't had an "easy" Space victory thwarted by a massive invasion either, so that may change my tune

Oh, and the Snaky Continents variation is almost a different map altogether. Play a naval civ like Ragnar or Willem and you'll leave the AI standing still when it comes to teching.

 

[Welnic]

Big and Small looks like the way to go at the moment. I've started out with that and liked it, but I will be trying other maps.

 

[Pomp]

I've been primarily playing Hemispheres, although the script seems inordinately fond of giving me exactly two continents even though I select Random every time.

 

[illram]

Put me in the big and small camp. Definitely makes early navies and exploration more of a factor, and the islands aren't just little nothing islands with one fish that are a waste of time. The script is also customizable and all in all it makes some pretty interesting maps.

 

[futurehermit]

I'm playing a game now with hemispheres (2 continents) and am LOVING it.

New favourite map by far!!!

Reasons:

1) You can assign exactly 2 continents, which is what I always wanted when playing regular continents but would get 3-4 often

2) There are a number of islands which you can settle which makes optics-astronomy just as appealing as liberalism!!! GREAT!!!

 

[Sir Jaref]

I play Hemispheres with:

Varied continents
Islands
Random number

So far I've been getting pretty realistic looking worlds. I love it

 

[dozenlong]

I have played a few big and small maps that were fun, but I haven't tried hemispheres yet...I think I may start a game now!

 

[uncarved block]

OK, I've just had my a$$ handed to me on three Inland Sea map games- in the first 250 turns- so there's definitely something of an advantage to the human player on Big and Small. Quite a change from leading all the AIs by three techs (at least) in the space race as de Gaulle, to barely even making it to Macemen ahead of the last place AI. I'll try a Hemisphere game or two next and see if there's some happy medium.

It was funny seeing Monty vassalize to Peter (!) the turn that I showed up with a SoD, though, like a little girl running behind mommy's apron

 

[BARBEERIAN]

OK, I've just had my a$$ handed to me on three Inland Sea map games- in the first 250 turns- so there's definitely something of an advantage to the human player on Big and Small. Quite a change from leading all the AIs by three techs (at least) in the space race as de Gaulle, to barely even making it to Macemen ahead of the last place AI. I'll try a Hemisphere game or two next and see if there's some happy medium.

The difference is the very early contact between all civs on Inland Sea vs. later contact on Big'n'Small or Hemispheres. More friends and enemies are made sooner on Inland Sea, and you are the type of person who likes having a state religion your almost guaranteed to get DoW'd on in an inland sea where any civ can get to you rather easily with a few open border agreements.

 

[bovinespy]

I spent about an hour yesterday generating maps with different combos of scripts, sea levels, etc. I like to find one map type and try all the different civs and leaders on that map type so as to make useful comparisons between games, as opposed to random weirdness or "cherry-picking" maps (e.g. archipelago/high sea level for the Dutch or pangea/low sea level for the Romans).

With that said, I think I'll be sticking with Big and Small, low sea level, islands, separate island groups, 12 civs. I like this mix because there's usually 2 or 3 nice-sized funky-shaped blobs, that usually have 2 to 5 civs on each, and then there's almost always at least one or two big islands and a bunch of little ones left for colonizing. It's not as cramped as Terra, but unlike Fractal, I'm almost always assured some land for colonizing.

 

[uncarved block]

Ah, Barbeerian, I was only referring to the tech race-- sorry if I was unclear. I went back to Inland Sea because it was my default map for Warlords, and figured it would give me a good sense of how the AI had changed. It didn't help that all the AI capitols I got a chance to check out had either two Gems or Gold in the BFC-- it just seemed like all the AI land was better developed than what I saw on the Big and Small maps. (Playing Boudica and being 20+ tiles away from each neighbor didn't help either.) While early contact may have played some role in the beatdowns, I was losing ground well before Alphabet, as I discovered when I was able to tech trade. In the last game, Hannibal DoWed me when I had no state religion, though that was because of over expansion. Could you pass up the chance to take out Izzy with two Axes, though?

This was the first time I'd had real problems with the city governor, to digress. I've been doing OK with the new happiness caps on Noble, but every time I turned around my cities were set for growth that was going to lead to unhappiness. I'm accustomed to a little trouble with those buggers, but this was ridiculous . . .

 

[Nikis-Knight]

This was the first time I'd had real problems with the city governor, to digress. I've been doing OK with the new happiness caps on Noble, but every time I turned around my cities were set for growth that was going to lead to unhappiness. I'm accustomed to a little trouble with those buggers, but this was ridiculous . . .

Were you running slavery? The city governor now breeds extra people for whipping.

 

[scherbchen]

just a random experience here. in my last hemisphere game (2 continents, regular sea levels, islands normal size, standard map size 7 oponents) i was surprised to have 4 (four!) continets instead of 2.

granted, 3 of those were close together and reachable without crossing ocean tiles. i was still surprised.

 

[uncarved block]

Thanks Nikis-Knight, that was a tweak I hadn't heard about. Makes sense, and would even have been OK if I'd had more than one source of to play with. I'll try putting "Emphasize Production" on tonight and see if that gets a happy medium.