Conquer Club

both.

What's more, I just checked, and the territory count is good too if all stations & industrial centers are coded as neutrals.

42 = golden number.

Ok I put in 888:s and some bonus amounts

I'm liking the map so far. Do you have to hold the stations within the areas to get land bonuses?

I think you could darken the colour for China a bit; for my eyes it blends with Mongolia too well...
Also to me the mountain impassables aren't very clear, especially when bordering East Russia as they're a similar shade.

Could you move the 888 and name for Tuva up a bit? And maybe Zavkhan slightly to the right?

Oh yeah and I think the bonus for North Russia is a little high, 3 might be better when compared to Mongolia.

Do you have to hold the stations within the areas to get land bonuses?

no, they're separate from the land bonuses.

I think you could darken the colour for China a bit; for my eyes it blends with Mongolia too well...
Also to me the mountain impassables aren't very clear, especially when bordering East Russia as they're a similar shade.

I'll deal with the graphics after the gameplay is done... this is just a gameplay draft, it is not meant to represent the final graphical form of the map.

As for north russia, I agree.

My major issue with the map is the fonts. They just don't...fit. The title's great in that regard, but the territory names look bland and the explanation text doesn't quite match the "imperfect" style you're going for. The degradation looks more like graphical flaws than intentional additions for thematic accuracy.

Yeah, the font does seem to be off, but wouldn't that be dealt with later? This is just the Melting Pot.

however:

Nice 3D effects! I can't say which I like better, the one with the title at the top or the one with the title in the legend...

This map is ready for further discussion in the Gameplay Workshop!

whoo whoooooooo

Break it down now!

Ok, then for some gameplay development...

So, since there are less of the side stations and side lines on this map, this requires a bit different gameplay than OE.

As some of you remember, I was going to do this "+1 auto on each station" on the OE map, but then the gameplay kinda drifted in another direction. So on this map I'm giving it another shot...

Additionally I have bonuses for holding certain pieces of the rail on this map, instead of country-based bonuses.

So the stations are really powerful on this map. There are 5 rail bonuses, and with autodeploys they give:

St.P.-Kirov-Yekater. - 3 territories - 2+1 = 3 troops
Moscow-Novosibirsk - 4 territories - 1+5 = 6 troops
Novosibirsk-Chita - 4 territories - 1+4 = 5 troops
Chita-Vladivostok (via Tynda/Bir.) - 4 territories - 0+5 = 5 troops
Chita-Vladivostok (via Harbin) - 3 territories 2+3 = 5 troops
Beijing, Harbin & Seoul - 3 territories - 2+0 = 2 troops

So, does anyone think this makes the stations too powerful, like in such a scale that they might imbalance the game? Or could this be feasible?

This also raises the question of neutral counts for the stations: what is a good amount, that makes them hard to take, but not too hard so that players will just ignore them?

It's definitely complex but I don't think too powerfull. I think some of it needs to be re-arranged. For example holding from Moscow to Novosbirisk seems like it should be +2 to me.

...well, on second thought maybe the stations are too powerful... I'll look at this with greater thought tomorrow.

Any more opinions on this?

I got nothing. Just graphics suggestions.

I kind of think if the victory condition is hold the stations, and if each station is a +1 auto deploy it will inevitably lead to players ignoring the regular territories and stacking on the stations.

I could increase the objective to hold all the transsib stations...

You know, I'm starting to think I should wait and see how OE does in beta to see how that objective works in practice, so I'll know what to do with this map...

natty_dread wrote:I could increase the objective to hold all the transsib stations...

You know, I'm starting to think I should wait and see how OE does in beta to see how that objective works in practice, so I'll know what to do with this map...

That would make it easier on you.

Hm. I guess I could put this thing on hold until OE has been in beta for a while...

No need to bin this though, I hope it won't be that long

I think, with some experience on OE now, I'm going to keep the objective low... I might even lower it - I may even have to lower OE:s objective (amount of stations to hold) so I think there's no point increasing it here...

As for the station bonus... I think the autodeploys could work for this map. Not sure but maybe?

Anyone have any input on this?

I don't really have any idea what to do with this now.