[Abandoned] Struggle for Oil: Central Asia

[Raskholnikov]

Ok these are the specific changes we're implementing for the next version. Please comment if you have any changes or other suggestions to make. Thanks!

A. Legend:

STRUGGLE FOR OIL
When Demand Outstrips Supply

OIL MASTERY
To Win, hold for 1 round either:
* all 8 Terrorists; or
* any 5 Capitals & 3 Metropolis

SEAS CONTROL
Each Sea connects all bordering
tankers & reverts to 3 neutral

AL-MAHDI (AM)
(insert symbol) Uprisings 1way attack AM;
AM 1way attacks Cairo & all Terrorists;
+2 for each Terrorist if holding AM.

BONUSES (no change)

SPECIAL ATTACKS
Capitals: 1way attack US Fleets
Metropolis: attack each other
US Fleets: revert to 4 neutral;
bombard any Terrorists & Tankers
Bombard range: (same)
Terrorists: attack each other;
bombard any Refineries in
a range of 2 territories

CAUCASUS BONUS: +3 (no change)

REGIONAL BONUSES
Russia: 8
China: 7
India, Eastern Europe: 6
Afpak, Iran: 5
Turkey: 4
Middle East: 3
Kazakhstan: 14
Central Asia: 7
Caucasus: 3

B. On map:

-change Arunchal and both US Fleets from 3 neutral to 4 neutral;
-revise borders of frontier as per map below:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/48419011@N06/5375584301/

[ender516]

"When Supply Outstrips Demand"?? Shouldn't that be the other way around?

I am on the road right now, but I do hope to get to a first draft of the XML this week.

[Raskholnikov]

LOL Absolutely. Corrected.

[Kabanellas]

I've been analyzing the game-play for a while... passing the mouse over those numbers in the hopes of getting some assistance from BOB... but no BOB yet

Though very complicated, I think that the game-play could be very challenging and interesting.

Some concerns appeared to me right from the start:

-Some of those countries seem quite hard to hold. Especially with those uprisings over the borders. Others might be yielding a bit too much if you add those additional bonus (capitals,refineries,tanks) - have you made a table for this? Widowmakers' bonus spreadsheet
-Will the Tankers and Refineries start neutral? Guess not.... The bonus might be exponential after you take 1 capital....
-I find the upper legend a bit confusing - Seas control?.... Al Mahdi? don't quite get it.....

[Raskholnikov]

I've been analyzing the game-play for a while... passing the mouse over those numbers in the hopes of getting some assistance from BOB... but no BOB yet

Though very complicated, I think that the game-play could be very challenging and interesting.

Some concerns appeared to me right from the start:

-Some of those countries seem quite hard to hold. Especially with those uprisings over the borders.
Yes, we are reducing some borders as will be seen in the next version.

Others might be yielding a bit too much if you add those additional bonus (capitals,refineries,tanks) - have you made a table for this? Widowmakers' bonus spreadsheet
Yes, we did. The only ones that offers "too much" might be Central Asia and Kazakhstan. This is on purpose, as the game is designed to encourage a "rush to the middle" where a lot of the gas and oil resources are located. AS you may have noted, neither of these has any capital or metropolis, so they are not active players in the "struggle for oil", but rather "the battlefield". Obviosuly, given the title of the map, if a player gains control of these area(s) they have gone a long way towards winning the game. In addition, this win option is counterbalanced by the objective win options. So multiple strategies are available to win.
-Will the Tankers and Refineries start neutral? Guess not.... The bonus might be exponential after you take 1 capital....
Once a player holds a capital, the taker and refinery bonuses are awarded only in multiples (every 2; every 3) in order to avoid such exponential increases. It's quite similar to Napoleonic Europe's bonus scheme for land and naval battles (although I do note that there, all naval battles start 2-neutral; however, here we have not only capitals, but also metropolis, terrorists and uprisings starting neutral so we couldn't add even more territories as neutral without having a totally unbalanced gameplay).
-I find the upper legend a bit confusing - Seas control?.... Al Mahdi? don't quite get it.....
a) Seas control: there are 3 Sea territories. they connect the adjacent territories containing a tanker. They strt as 3 neutral and revert to 3 neutral.
b) Al Mahdi: will add the symbol to the legend. See lower left-hand corner of the map, under Egypt. This represents the religious factor: Al-Mahdi is the 12th Shia Imam reputed to come back and restore the Khalifate. In the 1880s, a person claiming to be him actually arose, beat the Brits and set up the first Soudanese religious state. It starts as 8 neutral and can be one way attacked by any uprising, thus increasing the role of uprisings and showing that any such uprising could widen in a full-fledged religious mouvement. Al Mahdi can onee-way attack Cairo and any terrorist unit, thus facilitating the creation of a religious-terrorist network capable of meeting one of the winning conditions by objective.

Thanks for your input - much appreciated!

[theBastard]

the gameplay looks realy comprehensive.
I have some notices, mainly for graphic:

- could rafineries have another colour as teal? they are the same as teal numbers.
- could tankers have a little another colour as rafineries? maybe only shade?
- the lines of bombard by US fleets are not clear, could US 6th fleet bombard tanker in Bagdad?
- does Bishkek borders with Ili kazakh?

- what about to do that only capitals in US fleet range could assault US fleets? I mean Ankara, Moscow, Kiev, Teheran could assault US 6th fleet and Ar Riyad, Islamabad, New Dehli, Teheran could aasault US 5th fleet?

or maybe you should add there also any Russian military power (as US fleets) which could has control from Kiev, Black sea, Caucasus, Kazakstan, to Krasnojarsk...and a little change range of US 6th fleet...

Click image to enlarge.

[Raskholnikov]

thanks for your comments -will look into your points - esp the Bishkek border issue, and the tanker and refinery colors. the other two, about gameplay, although iteresting, would make the game more complex and, most importanty, would require more legend space to explain, which we don't really have. However, for the idea that only capitals within fleet range to take control of a US fleet, I will ask pamoa his opinion and see if it's feasable. thanks for your input!

[Industrial Helix]

I think you might want to put one of those fire symbols in Cairo.

[Raskholnikov]

LOL - See how topical our map is? Look where the arrow of the Al-Mahdi is pointing to!!! How's that for foresight? You better get this map quenched quickly!!! Hahahaha!

[pamoa]

v05 new features : bonus structure, special attacks, borders, wording

Click image to enlarge.

[Raskholnikov]

Latest update and commentary posted at top of the page.

I am truly, really excited about this map! Can't believe the Egyptian revolution is happening just as we are working on this! I hope we can get to play this soon.... LOL.... I guess I AM biased.....

[Industrial Helix]

four corner border at Bihkek, Almaty, Ili Kaza

Edit... what attacks the US fleets?

[TaCktiX]

This is a long list.

- I've got reservations on the color scheme. As it is, the glow separating bonuses is visible but vaguely so. The regions can be missed on a first glance, particularly China and Central Asia (which having the highest concentration of color you'd think the opposite). The blue tint to the map is fine, but the glow is too understated and I'd be more preferential to either it being bigger or the regions being solid. In a map this complex, missing bonus regions would be a big deal.
- Text is squeezed in wherever you can fit it, and it shows. Several cities that should have a hyphen in their name (Islamabad, Kandahar offhand) don't have it because you don't have the space. I would suggest figuring out some solution to this, even if it's just a hyphen so people don't get it confused with two words instead of one.

Several cities and regions have what I assume to be regional spellings. However, you fudged on these:
- Calcutta is Kolkata in the local dialect.
- New Dehli is New Delhi
- Even if Bagdad is right, everyone is going to wonder why it's not Baghdad.
- Cashmir should be Kashmir, as per the Led Zeppelin song and the UN (former more important, obviously)

- The title and legend are...wow blah. In general, while the fonts of the legend are functional I'm not a fan of Courier New or similar monotype fonts at all. The legend adds no flavor to your concept, leaving all of the heavy lifting to your symbols. Add some fonts that would evoke the flavor of the struggle for oil. Right now I feel like I'm looking at a struggle for all of that text to fit into a tiny space.
- The bombard description can be interpreted many ways. First time I was just reading the legend I read that 5th Flt can bombard the Caspian and Black Seas. Then when I was looking at the map I thought "so they're able to bombard all of those territories?" Then I looked back at a different section of the legend and arrived at what I SUPPOSE is the right conclusion: "the fleets can attack the terrorists and tankers within the arc." Not straightforward at all.
- How the heck do you attack the Fleets in the first place? Never mentioned anywhere.
- Metropolis is properly pluralized by "Metropolises." The use of the singular is out of keeping with the rest of the legend which uses plurals just fine.
- "US Fleets revert to 4 neutral AND bombard all Tankers & Terrorists." Also I find it weird that you mention the killer neutral before you mention what it does. Normally it's the reverse, but your call.
- The use of the apostrophe with "Regions' Bonuses" is odd. You can get away with simply "Region Bonuses."
- The legend is riddled between both lower case and capitals starting sentences or perceived sentences. If it starts a legend box, capitalize, at the very least (Each Sea, e.g.).
- Do terrorists have a bombard range AND an attack range of two? Or can they all attack each other period, and bombard is only range 2. The way the sentence is constructed I can't tell which.
- Why the switch between using numerals and spelling it out in the bonuses? The differentiator looks odd instead of helping to aid understanding of the map.

Now this is an outside consideration, but the general issue with this map is cramping on account of space. You started the development before Supersize existed, but I think a couple hundred extra pixels on either dimension would help you explain things fully without getting confusing. As it is, I don't see how you'll ever clarify my above bucket list without more space.

[Raskholnikov]

four corner border at Bihkek, Almaty, Ili Kaza

Edit... what attacks the US fleets?

Yes, we'll deal with the 4-corner issue.

All capitals attack 1 way US fleets, as per legend.

[Raskholnikov]

This is a long list.

Thanks for the detailed and constructive criticism.

- I've got reservations on the color scheme. As it is, the glow separating bonuses is visible but vaguely so. The regions can be missed on a first glance, particularly China and Central Asia (which having the highest concentration of color you'd think the opposite). The blue tint to the map is fine, but the glow is too understated and I'd be more preferential to either it being bigger or the regions being solid. In a map this complex, missing bonus regions would be a big deal.

thanks, we will look into this and try to improve the color scheme (including the color blind issues raised by Industrial Helix)

- Text is squeezed in wherever you can fit it, and it shows. Several cities that should have a hyphen in their name (Islamabad, Kandahar offhand) don't have it because you don't have the space. I would suggest figuring out some solution to this, even if it's just a hyphen so people don't get it confused with two words instead of one.

Ok.

Several cities and regions have what I assume to be regional spellings. However, you fudged on these:
- Calcutta is Kolkata in the local dialect.
- New Dehli is New Delhi
- Even if Bagdad is right, everyone is going to wonder why it's not Baghdad.
- Cashmir should be Kashmir, as per the Led Zeppelin song and the UN (former more important, obviously)

We will revise all names to ensure consistency. Right now we have a mix of English and French spellings lol.

- The title and legend are...wow blah. In general, while the fonts of the legend are functional I'm not a fan of Courier New or similar monotype fonts at all. The legend adds no flavor to your concept, leaving all of the heavy lifting to your symbols. Add some fonts that would evoke the flavor of the struggle for oil. Right now I feel like I'm looking at a struggle for all of that text to fit into a tiny space.

Functional is the look we wanted to achieve. Think of the maps you see in war movie Situation Rooms. They are funcctional, multi-pannelled, not fussy. We want this map to look like it could belong on a Situation Room screen, ready to be commented on by Generals and politicians. Any added "flavour" would detract from this. At least this is our take on the theme....

- The bombard description can be interpreted many ways. First time I was just reading the legend I read that 5th Flt can bombard the Caspian and Black Seas. Then when I was looking at the map I thought "so they're able to bombard all of those territories?" Then I looked back at a different section of the legend and arrived at what I SUPPOSE is the right conclusion: "the fleets can attack the terrorists and tankers within the arc." Not straightforward at all.

Well, the legend says, first, that Fleets can bombard all terrorist and tankers; and second, that each fleet has a bombarding range. so, this means that they can bombard all terrorists and tankers in their range. although the instructions are broken into 2 parts, they follow each other and are clear. How exactly do you propose to re-word this, keeping in mind space comnstraints?

- How the heck do you attack the Fleets in the first place? Never mentioned anywhere.

Actually, the legend says "Capitals 1way attack US fleets". (First line in Special Attacks).

- Metropolis is properly pluralized by "Metropolises." The use of the singular is out of keeping with the rest of the legend which uses plurals just fine.

OK.

- "US Fleets revert to 4 neutral AND bombard all Tankers & Terrorists." Also I find it weird that you mention the killer neutral before you mention what it does. Normally it's the reverse, but your call.

OK. The order is due to space issues. I don't think it really is a problem.

- The use of the apostrophe with "Regions' Bonuses" is odd. You can get away with simply "Region Bonuses."

OK.

- The legend is riddled between both lower case and capitals starting sentences or perceived sentences. If it starts a legend box, capitalize, at the very least (Each Sea, e.g.).

OK.

- Do terrorists have a bombard range AND an attack range of two? Or can they all attack each other period, and bombard is only range 2. The way the sentence is constructed I can't tell which.

The second interpretation is correct. They can all attack each other. They can attack refineries ONLY within a 2 territory range.


- Why the switch between using numerals and spelling it out in the bonuses? The differentiator looks odd instead of helping to aid understanding of the map.

Numerals only will be used.

Now this is an outside consideration, but the general issue with this map is cramping on account of space. You started the development before Supersize existed, but I think a couple hundred extra pixels on either dimension would help you explain things fully without getting confusing. As it is, I don't see how you'll ever clarify my above bucket list without more space.

Is Supersize implemented? If so, what are the new rules?

Thanks again for your comments. I don't see any deal breaker here; most of your concerns can be accomodated. The theme issue becomes a question of interpretation; I hope I was able to put across our point of view.

Finally, I note all comments are graphics-related. If so, and no game-play issues remain, can we move on to the graphics section and properly deal with these issues there?

R