Conquer Club

Hello Dub Warrior...i'm here for a preliminary review please forgive if some things have already been discussed and edited.
This is a nice small map in some colour combinations that haven't been seen before... turning out well. I like the citrus colours you've applied, your border design is suitable and periodic, and in particular the curve you have around the title.
For an older person like me, i'd like to see the very small territory names slightly larger in font size.
The overall size on version 6 will still have to be reduced to 630px width, as it stands now at 668px.
"french" king in story needs a capital F.
Some rivers around Brugge are a bit pixely.
Perhaps the inset legend map can be reduced slightly in size also to give the sea line some real estate.
You've got a four-way border around Axel, Hulst, Lokeren, Beveren that will need amending. And the same at Doornik, Hergen etc...they simply need to be offset a little.
The territory borders will need tidying slightly, some lines are thicker than others, and one of then doesn't intersect properly....the border of Eeklo just north-west of Brugge.
But overall, coming along nicely.

cairnswk wrote:Hello Dub Warrior...i'm here for a preliminary review please forgive if some things have already been discussed and edited.
This is a nice small map in some colour combinations that haven't been seen before... turning out well. I like the citrus colours you've applied, your border design is suitable and periodic, and in particular the curve you have around the title.
For an older person like me, i'd like to see the very small territory names slightly larger in font size.
The overall size on version 6 will still have to be reduced to 630px width, as it stands now at 668px.
"french" king in story needs a capital F.
Some rivers around Brugge are a bit pixely.
Perhaps the inset legend map can be reduced slightly in size also to give the sea line some real estate.
You've got a four-way border around Axel, Hulst, Lokeren, Beveren that will need amending. And the same at Doornik, Hergen etc...they simply need to be offset a little.
The territory borders will need tidying slightly, some lines are thicker than others, and one of then doesn't intersect properly....the border of Eeklo just north-west of Brugge.
But overall, coming along nicely.

older person? i thought you were in uni?

whitestazn88 wrote:...
older person? i thought you were in uni?

I am in uni. i worked for 34 years after high school and am now a "mature-age student" at James Cook Univeristy here in Cairns.
60 % of the uni's popluation are mature-aged students.
Oldies go to uni here in australia also whitestazn88.

Now back to topic...

cairnswk wrote:

whitestazn88 wrote:...
older person? i thought you were in uni?

I am in uni. i worked for 34 years after high school and am now a "mature-age student" at James Cook Univeristy here in Cairns.
60 % of the uni's popluation are mature-aged students.
Oldies go to uni here in australia also whitestazn88.

Now back to topic...

well i mean, oldies go to uni here too... but i always thought you were a youngie(?), i guess thats my fault for assuming most people participating in an online forum such as this one would be younger.

Thanks for all the comment so far. i'm just passing by to let you know that I'm on a holliday the next 2 weeks,
so no updates coming up.
but don't worry, I'll return

overall, i think the map looks good. its simple and effective.

if the darkened blobs (islands) in the NE corner of the map aren't necessary, I think it would look better without them.

i think its a good idea to have the rivers darker - the color of the ocean might not stand out enough, but it might if you added some depth in the rivers.

Hi,

The rivers are great so long as their thickness stays constant. Where it varies (like south of Brugge) they look like a mess. So I'd suggest you go for uniform thickness and it will be splendid.

I am late to join the commenting team.
But Flanders is next door, so I 'd like to give my input.
It's a nicely coloured map.

Change Title:
Flanders Uprising ! .
Seems more catchy a title

Put the "Golden Spurs battle" in the legend (as reference for interested players).
(..and lost it..in the Golden Spurs battle).



Was Antwerpen then still part of Brabant ?

Shouldn't Antwerp be more under/below the "impassable" river ?
Now you have to go from Antwerp to Brussels to Aalst thru Lokeren to get to Beveren...whereas Beveren is NEXT DOOR to Antwerp ?!?
If there is some sort of map necessity to install this detour feature, then please enlighten us..but I can't think of a good reason to move away from the historic and geographic realities here.
And if Antwerp was one of the major cities behind the revolt then they SHOULD have straight access to the Kroon Vlaanderen "continent".
And another thing; now Antwerp as a city with +1 auto deploy is in the corner of the map and being cuddly covered by oostburg and Brussel...that is too favourable for the player that is lucky enough to spawn in that region. So another reason to give direct access between Antwerp and Beveren (bridge).


Why is there this relatively huge sea link between Oostburg and Broekburg ?
The peasant army didnot have a naval fleet, nor did the french knights. Everything went overland.
Let's stick to the mobility of 1302 and remove unnecessary large sea(or flight :s) links.

cairnswk wrote:"french" king in story needs a capital F.

I suppose then the "French" knights and "Flemish" peasants need a lower case "f" ..

cheers

I like the map, it's calm and easy on the eyes, yet bold enough to be noticable. The rivers look fine to me

I say lighten the rivers a tad and darken the sea some... they don't have to look identical, but narrowing the gap might help.

lt_oddball wrote:Was Antwerpen then still part of Brabant ?

Just to answer this one:
In 1056, some northern parts of Brabant became part of Rijks-Vlaanderen. But, Antwerp stays part of Brabant, and BORDERS at that time with Rijks-Vlaanderen. Only in 1312, Antwerp became some democratic republic (only for a while, typicaly belgium history

Welcome back DubWarrior!

only few things:

• The color of rivers is good, maybe try to mix colors where rivers flow into the sea
• The sea route from Broekburg to Oostburg...it's possible not to have the route drawn on the minimap?
• Not a big fan of a All caps text for rebel strongholds, i think that the icon is enough

On the whole, the map is very nice and you're on the right way.
No reason to hold this map in the drafting room.



Onward and upward!

Have a nice day
thenobodies80

Congratulations, coming along very nicely through the foundry.

Well, Back with a new version...
and, it's great to get stamped

So, amongst the changes in version7:
- changed the border between Damme and Poperinge (so there isn't a connection any longer)
- same for the border of Duinkerke and Broekburg
- Blend the rivers and the sea
- cleaned up the rivers
- I didn't gave the borders more transparency, but made them equal and thinner
- some small changes; like lowering the city-icon in Kortrijk, and made the decorative frame symmetric
- resized the maps (back to 630px and 840px)
- gave groeninge and oudenaarde some more space, by putting their borders a bit to the east
- added a bridge between antwerpen and beveren.
- added a subtitle (Battle of the Golden Spurs)
- changed the mini-map
- made the text one pt bigger, and put the rebel strongholds in lower caps. (great comment!)
- added the gameplay-changes, made by neon peon, RedBaron and Oddball...thanks so far all!

Hi Dubw,

Still one old question:
Why is there this relatively huge sea link between Oostburg and Broekburg ?
The peasant army didnot have a naval fleet, nor did the french knights. Everything went overland.
Let's stick to the mobility of 1302 and remove unnecessary large sea (or airflight :s) links.

One other point:
You have the map of the battle area, but you don't get the gameplay of it:
Who plays the role of the french knights ?
All rebel cities have +1 (players immediately go for these .. like the city states in maps of ancient greece/Rome) and the rebels have the small but desired bonuszones of Oostervant, Rijskvlanderen and 4 Ambachten. So your map now gets the feel of an internal revolt map (as in the Flemish cities battle each other amongst eachother).
In order to have the french invading knights effect felt you need to add some autodeploy factor in the area of Bethune.
A castle ? A french flag ? +2 autodeploy ?

To balance things you must figure out how far the first next +1 town is away from the +2 of the french invading army as compared to the distance inbetween each +1 town.
(e.g. Ieper is then too close to Bethune..so you need to create some distance inbetween..so that "flemish" players have time to collect another +1 town before the "french" player hits on him/them.

Hi Oddball,
Thanks for all your comments so far. You bring up some true questions.
-This sea-link was an idea to link 2 'ends' on the map with eachother. If it's impossible for a player to cross the map, some good action can be taken in that way, by using this connection. it's just a very small detail, and can be easily removed from the map.
No armys where shipped at that time, but, as I said already, I try to make some historical background, not a scenario. Just to give an impression of that time, there is an auto-deploy on the major cities, and their is a sea-link, representing the traderoutes at that time (it's not a historic sealink, but cities such as bruges, had a very important sea-trade at that time)
So, the importance of 'free' trade-cities at that time is suggested with a sea-link and the auto deploy.
-The same answer for 'the french' part of the map. Their isn't a french part on the map, that's true. I suggest more an internal revolt. As I said, a scenario-map isn't exactly what I'm looking for so far; imagine a standard-game with 8 players? It's CC, its always an internal revolt So I'm more looking for a historical background, rather then a historical scenario.

On the other hand, it's just my opinion, some other players's opinions are welcome, It's to hard to make a decision now.
Thanks so far, but more comments are neccesary.

Grtz
DubWarrior

DubWarrior wrote:Thanks so far, but more comments are neccesary.

Grtz
DubWarrior

ok... waiting for more opinions

lt_oddball wrote:

DubWarrior wrote:Thanks so far, but more comments are neccesary.

Grtz
DubWarrior

ok... waiting for more opinions

I am waiting for an update There has not been one since Page 3.

Hey,

I replaced the image in the first post on page 1. that's the 7th update you see. Older version can be found beneath.
It looks like this one, I posted this one on August 20:

You are looking REAL good here Dub. Don't forget to change your title on your first post when you edit, it still says your last update was 3 weeks ago...

Usually gameplay discussions begin in earnest now. The biggest concerns I'm seeing right now is the small 2 territory bonus regions may be dropped on the start of a fair amount of games. And what about the rebel strongholds? Will they start as neutral?

Take a look at these utilities and see what you come up with concerning your bonuses.

Bonus Probability Calculator

Continent Bonus Spreadsheets and other useful map making tools

I used the CC_MAP_BONUS_CALC.xls file.
It comes up with some suprising changes for the bonus.
The results of it are:
Bonus for:
Duinkerke:+2
Artesie:+5
Kroonvlaanderen: +10 (!)
Rijksvlaanderen: +3
Henegouwen: +4
Vier ambachten: +3
Brabant:+3
Kortrijk: +5
Oostervan: +4

some professional advice would be welcome here...do I need to make these changes on the map?

DubWarrior wrote:I used the CC_MAP_BONUS_CALC.xls file.
It comes up with some suprising changes for the bonus.
The results of it are:
Bonus for:
Duinkerke:+2
Artesie:+5
Kroonvlaanderen: +10 (!)
Rijksvlaanderen: +3
Henegouwen: +4
Vier ambachten: +3
Brabant:+3
Kortrijk: +5
Oostervan: +4

some professional advice would be welcome here...do I need to make these changes on the map?

The general xls calculators are just that; general.
Only looking at terr/3 =+1 and each open border = +1 extra.
That serves as a start..but you can and should tweak it upwards or downwards depending on your map/concept.

In your map you already have +1 autodeploy of key towns INSIDE the greater zones.
At least those should be substracted.

Also it makes a difference if the bordering zone at your border is just one zone or is there a whole world of multiple bonuszones behind it (..edit before: was a bad example with bad conclusion..).

Also a border may border 2 or 3 opposite territories that belong to one or up to three different bonuszones..makes a huge difference compared to bordering just one opposing territory.

Just think it over and do a first suggestion. We'll do the criticism

on the map, sint omaars is where vinoxbergen ought to be and vinoxbergen is where sint omaars is really located. consider combining duinkerke bonus zone with artesie, since it's not good design to have the easiest bonus in a corner of the map. similarly, brabant can be changed by inserting the city of mechelen (which was later the capital city of the burgundian netherlands) between antwerpen and brussel. anderlecht is a possible fourth region in brabant, west of brussel, if u need one - modern football fans might find this one interesting.

http://www.visitflanders.co.uk/go/desti ... story.html
http://www.cs.kuleuven.be/~maarten/maps/Begvl.html

doornik was a french royal city, if u want to try lt_oddball's idea of letting one area represent the french king.

http://www.fahnenkontor24.de/FOTW/flags/be-whtto.html

u'll have to fix the borders at lokeren-axel-hulst-beveren and sint amands-doornik-bergen-valenciennes because it's unclear whether troops can attack across the corner. is the dutch spelling valencijn instead of valenciennes?

ian.

Nice looking map- I look forward to seeing it come to life. The only thing I have to contribute at the moment is that the text has a few mistakes:

"The independence in some major cities in the French province of Flanders worried the french king. In 1302 he declared war on the rebels... and lost it. The french knights were defeated by an army of Flemish peasants."

Better:

"The independence of some major cities in the French province of Flanders worried the French king. In 1302 he declared war on the rebels... and lost. The French knights were defeated by an army of Flemish peasants."

My suggestion:

"1302. Worried by growing signs of independence in the major cities of French controlled Flanders, King Philip IV declared war on the rebels... and lost. The knights of the French army were defeated by an army of Flemish peasants."

Good luck with this one- it looks really promising.

back with the 8th version.
amongst the changes made:

-combined the Artesië-region with the Duinkerke-region.
-replaced Vinoxbergen with the more important city of Kassel (together with Kortrijk one of the last French strongholds in 1302)
-placed Sint-Omaars beneath the army-circle of Vinoxbergen
-added the city of Arras
-added the city of Mechelen
-changed the bonusses.
-changed the legend
-fixed the border of Axel, Lokeren, hulst, beveren
-replaced Valenciennes by Valencijn
-used the textline of the post by Symmetry
-made Brugge and Arras an auto-deploy+2: Now Flanders and France have both some 'basis'. Historically, the revolt started in Brugge for Flanders. And the French knights gathered in Arras before assaulting Kortrijk.